


Perigean Spring

by Unfortunate_Twihard



Category: Twilight Series - Stephenie Meyer
Genre: Alice is the new girl, Alternate Universe, F/M, Fluff, Human!Alice, Hurt/Comfort, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Vampire!Jasper
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-03-19
Updated: 2017-11-09
Packaged: 2018-10-07 15:35:22
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 11
Words: 31,668
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10363785
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Unfortunate_Twihard/pseuds/Unfortunate_Twihard
Summary: After her world is rocked by tragedy, Alice Brandon moves to Forks, WA, to live with her aunt. Dogged by nightmares of a man with red eyes and intrigued by the mysterious and reclusive Cullens, Alice is doing her best to just get through the next two years... A task easier said than done.





	1. Chapter 1

I was pinned to the wall by him.

My shirt was torn open, my eyes wet with tears, as he leaned in.

He caressed my cheek, smiling a smile, that, in any other situation, would have been kindly. Considering how familiar he was to me, it probably should be.

But I knew exactly what he was planning to do.

"Smile for the camera, Alice."

I jerked awake.

I leaned my head against the cool window on the bus, to calm myself.

Breathe in... Breathe out... Breathe in... Breathe out...

The bumping, rocking motion wasn't exactly pleasant, but apparently my cheapskate dad couldn't be bothered to buy a plane ticket, so here I was. I'd run out of things to do on a four-day long bus ride. I'd used every page in my sketchbook, I'd read every book that I'd brought in my bag (Which was a lovely purse as well, big bags were in style), and I'd listened to the entire contents of my ipod -twice- so it was out of battery. I could go back to sleep... But that would lead to the possibility of yet another disturbing dream. This one had been haunting me with more and more frequency.

Alright. Let me back-pedal, and explain. I was off to Forks, Washington, a little town that I hadn't visited since I was six, because I was going to live with my Aunt Mary. Aunt Mary was my Mom's sister, and I was her namesake. According to my father and step-mother, this made it okay to send me off to live with her, although it had been over a decade since I'd last seen her.

Admittedly, they weren't thinking properly, too overcome by grief to really consider much of anything...

But if I thought of that any more, I'd start crying again.

The bus reached a rest stop. I stood, grateful for a chance to stretch my legs and grab some breakfast.

"The next stop's Port Angeles," the driver said, as I walked by him.

“Thanks." I guess he recognized me, since we’d been together on this route for the past day, once I’d transferred onto this bus, the last leg of my journey.

I hurried into the cafe and bought a large coffee. Usually I was hyper enough without caffeine, but ever since I started having the nightmares, I tried to stay up as late as I could. And if I did sleep, I didn't do it well. I'd doze, not letting myself go enough to fall into the deep sleep required for my worst dreams. After the slip up earlier, I'd need to be even more vigilant.

I spent the remainder of my ride sipping my coffee and imagining what my aunt would be like.

I had few memories of my mother, she'd died when I was very young. My father had kept up intermittent communication with my aunt until he remarried, my stepmother had gotten aggravated that he stayed in touch with "that woman"'s family, and demanded he cease and desist.

I wondered if my Aunt would be like my mother.

In my memories, she was the caring one, the one who finger-painted with me, and didn't get upset when I wiped my hands on the cat. She'd moved through her days in a bright haze, cooking and cleaning with music playing, dancing instead of walking, and then run out into the yard to tend to her garden. She'd been content to keep house for her husband and child (In those few early memories, my father was much happier, more affectionate, more tender, making it easier to imagine my mother loving him), and she seemed genuinely pleased when she completed her tasks.

I wished I'd had a chance to ask her about that, why she, such a bright, energetic woman, had chosen to play house-keeper, instead of going into the world and making a name for herself.

I had two conflicting fears- one was that my Aunt would be similar to the dream version, so similar it made my heart ache for what I missed, and the other was that she would be cold and unkind, and make me question if I'd imagined the memories of my mother. But there was no point in worrying over what I couldn't change. I'd learned that much, at least, over the past year.

I pressed my hand on the seat in front of me as the bus wheels squealed to a stop, bracing myself.

I was one of three getting off at this stop. I'd brought a duffle bag of essentials, the rest of my clothes (The ones appropriate for Forks, anyways) were being shipped to Aunt Mary's house, along with the few belongings I'd felt any inclination to bring.

I scanned the faces of the people walking along the street, searching for someone even remotely familiar. Of course, no such luck.

"Mary-Alice?" Asked a soft voice from behind me. I turned to see a woman who stood at about 5'6", meaning little old me at 4'11" had to crane my neck to see her. 

"Aunt Mary?"

"Hello dear." Her smile seemed sincere, although she didn't reach out to me. "The car's parked around the corner, can you handle your bags?"

I knew I seemed frail to a lot of people, tiny, not even weighing a hundred pounds. Add to that pale skin, dark hair, and blue eyes, and people assumed that I was a little china doll. But I was stronger than I looked.

"Yes, thank you."

She wasn't very talkative. I studied her on the walk to the car, and noticed that she had the same dark hair and blue eyes as me. Our faces were similar in shape as well, and our skin shared the same milky pallor.

Aside from the difference in height, she could be me in twenty years.

I dumped my bag in the trunk and settled in the car.

The ride was mostly silent. I was generally a talkative person, and she seemed as if she was used to things being quiet. I wondered exactly how we'd manage.  
"There's the high school," She pointed out. "You'll start tomorrow, I've already enrolled you."

"Thank you, again, for taking me in."

She nodded, keeping her eyes on the road. I was grateful that she didn't mention why, exactly, she had to take me in.

The house was a small, two-story deal. There was a big oak tree in the front yard, its branches providing a screen in front of the upper windows. The house was white with dark green shutters, and a door to match. We entered the house, and I saw that throughout the living room, there were bookshelves full of Native American art. I looked at my aunt quizzically.

"What's all this?"

"This? It's what I do in Forks."

I still must have looked confused, because she clarified, "I moved to Forks so I could research the Quileute tribe for my book.”

Oh, that was right. Aunt Mary was a historian. I nodded. The silence was a lot for me.

"Let me show you to your room."

She led me upstairs, to the room at the end of the hall. I had a bad feeling about the room, the interior of the house was painted with dark colors, with dark-wood furniture. The lamps added a warm glow to it, giving it a nice effect, but if I was going to be living in Forks, where the sun made an appearance so rarely, it would be nice to have a little light.

I was surprised to see that the room was painted sky blue, the bed was made up with a flowered quilt and about a half dozen throw pillows on top. There was a hanging light that gave off a white glow, the bookshelves in one corner were white, as was the vanity in the other. Gauzy white curtains covered the windows.

I looked at my aunt in shock, it was lovely. She smiled at me. "You can decorate it as you like," was all she said. I dragged my bag in, and she showed me the bathroom. 

"I've got one in my room, so this one's all yours." It was nice, if a little small.

I followed her down the stairs into the kitchen. She opened the fridge and pulled out a pitcher of sweet tea. She poured herself a glass, and offered me one. I accepted, smiling a bit. Mississippi may not be part of the deep south, but although we were a bit farther west, we still held close the traditions. Always having a pitcher full of tea so sweet it could rot your teeth was just one of them. Of course, Aunt Mary would know that, she'd grown up there with Mom. I sipped it, and was surprised by a wave of homesickness. I hadn't expected to find anything like Biloxi in Forks.

"I usually keep odd hours, but if the door to my office is closed, I'd like to ask that you don't disturb me unless there's an emergency. It breaks my concentration." I  
nodded at that.

She stared at her glass, as if she was considering saying more, but then changed her mind. "I hope you like it here, Mary Alice."

"Alice," I corrected.

She looked at me, confused.

"I just... I prefer Alice." I mumbled, embarrassed. It probably wasn't polite to tell that to the person you were named after.

"I suppose that will make it less confusing," She said slowly. "But I've thought of you as Mary Alice for all these years, it may be difficult for me to remember. I'll try, though."

I nodded again.

"I was surprised when your father called me. I hadn't expected to hear any more from him after Nancy died."

I tensed at my mother's name. She stood and put a hand on my shoulder as she passed. "He told me about what happened. And I'm very sorry."

As she left the room, I bit my lip to try to curb the tears.

I spent the rest of the evening unpacking. A few of my boxes had already arrived, the rest, I was sure, were coming. I smiled as I put up my cork-board on the wall. Then I unpacked the pictures. They were labeled by year and, in some cases, by event. I began pinning them up. The first one was of my mother. Aside from sharing the dark hair, we didn't look much alike. She was tanner and fitter than skinny old me. It was of her in a hospital bed, holding a newborn Cynthia.

Cynthia. Seeing the picture broke my heart all over again. My baby sister, Cynthia. She'd elected to stay with Dad, seeing as she wasn't the one who he was constantly fighting with. She'd grown up to look nothing like me, with blonde, wavy hair and big brown eyes. But we were best friends, though I was three years older.

Oh, Cynthia. I missed her already. I wondered how she was holding up.

The next few were of us as children. My favorite was when I was five and she was two, the both of us standing in the surf of the ocean, shrieking as it lapped at our feet. The pictures proceeded through a parade of soccer and baseball photos, pictures from birthday parties, Christmases, Halloweens, and Easters. In the pictures, you could see that when I was about six, my mom stopped appearing. It was also when Melissa first showed up.

Melissa. I sighed. I may have been able to stay in Mississippi if it weren't for the fact that she hated me. My father didn't like me much, but Melissa really and truly hated me.

I looked at the last few pictures. Faces of friends I wasn't likely to see again crowded the images. I felt a bit bad, I'd tried to be as nice as I possibly could about the goodbyes, but after everything, I wanted them to leave me alone, and to be gone. And I may have been rude about it. But that was understandable, considering. 

There was a whole other stack of photos to add... But those could wait. I couldn't look at them right now.

I had been on a bus for four days, I needed a shower.

Twenty minutes later, I walked out of the bathroom in a towel, smelling like soap and my blueberry shampoo. I pulled on a blue tank-top and yoga pants, ready for dinner and an early night. But one of the photos had come loose from an old stack, and the smiling face of a blond two year old boy looked up at me. And I turned off the lights and burrowed into the heaps of pillows and blankets, trying desperately not to cry.

That night, I dreamt of a voice. No person, no place, just the voice. I couldn't make out what it said, but there was a comforting quality to it, that faded into the sound of the rain on my window as I woke up.


	2. Chapter 2

I kept my head pressed into my pillow for a moment, savoring the last sweet dregs of sleep, before properly opening my eyes. Rolling over, I squinted at the clock. Six-thirty. Huh. How was I getting to school?

By seven fifteen I had fixed myself up with an over-large black and white striped sweater over a blue collared shirt and grey skinny jeans, my wavy, dark hair was up in a bun, and I'd even managed to dig my Louboutin bag out of my many boxes. (Alright, it was a knockoff, but no one needed to know that.) I had a good feeling about today. And my feelings tended to be correct.

Of course, that feeling plummeted when Aunt Mary told me I had to walk to school.

I was eating a bowl of Cheerios when she dropped this particular bomb.

"I have to head out to the rez now, I won't be home when you get back."

"How am I getting to school?"

She was already half-way out the door when she called to me, "You're walking, of course."

I eyed the drizzling rain out the window. Great. My raincoat so did not go with my outfit.

By the time I'd reached school, my raincoat was the last thing on my mind. My hair usually was okay with humidity, but in this rain... I shuddered to think about what would have happened if it were down.

I made a dash for the building labeled "Administration", hoping that was where I picked up my schedule.

Once I got in, I pushed the hood of my yellow rain-slicker off my head and shook out my umbrella.

"Hello," I said, as the lady at the desk looked up. "I'm new, my name is-"

"Mary Brandon. Here's your schedule, here's a map, and here's a slip you need your teachers to sign."

I smiled, a bit nervously. How did she know my name?

I guess small towns hold no secrets.

I headed to my first class, which was English. The map was actually very helpful. I only made two wrong turns. Because I arrived a few minutes early, I was able to get the teacher to sign the paper and take a seat. There were a few students already trickling in, and I smiled at the brunette sitting next to me.

"Hi! I'm-"

"Mary Alice." She returned my grin just as strongly. "We heard about you."

Wow. If that's not freaky...

"Actually, it's just Alice."

"Oh, okay! I'm Jessica!"

She was fairly friendly, but class was starting.

As the day passed, I was introduced to Jessica's friends, Lauren, Angela, Mike, and Eric. They all seemed nice, but they also were a bit nosy. Or maybe it was the small-  
town thing, I wasn't sure.

At lunch, the conversation basically went like this:

Jessica/Angela: Question about life in Biloxi.

Me: Answer.

Lauren: Snide remark.

Eric/Mike: Crude joke, most often about how Lauren and I should bang.

Angela: Be nice.

And repeat.

But they showed me to all my classes, and I didn't need the map once all afternoon.

While Mike walked me to history, he said, "Hey, everyone's hanging out at my house tonight, if you want to come."

I wasn't born yesterday. This wasn't just a 'let's hang out' thing, this was a 'his eyes haven't gone higher than my chest all afternoon' thing. "I don't know if my aunt will let me. I'll get back to you?"

"Yeah, sure."

Finally I entered my history class, the last one of the day. In Biloxi, you take American History junior year, Government senior year. Instead of switching me onto Fork's schedule of American History senior year, Government junior, they put me in a class for seniors.

I paused by the door. My teacher, a young woman, walked by me. "Hi. I'm-"

"Mary Alice." She said, not looking up from a book in her hands.

"Oh, it's Alice. Just Alice."

"Alright, Just Alice, here's my signature, and could you please sit next to Jasper."

I looked around. He half-raised his hand, so I knew who to sit with. He was pretty gorgeous, with shaggy blond hair and amber eyes. I navigated my way through the desks until I sat next to him. "Hi."

He gave me a sharp nod, but he kept his face turned away.

Jeez. Friendly.

The class was fairly simple. I'd already studied the drafting of the Constitution in Mississippi, so I zoned out. I hated boring, repetitive things like this. After class, Jasper walked out without a word. Why wouldn't he look at me?

I wasn't sure why it bothered me so much, especially since I'd spent all day wishing everyone here would stop looking at me.

Jessica caught up with me after school. "Hey, Alice, we're all going to Mike's after school. Do you want to come?"

I shrugged. "I don't know. I have to ask my aunt."

I had absolutely no intention of asking Aunt Mary if I could go. I didn't want to alienate these people, but although I was ahead in history, I was way behind in Algebra. I was actually in a Sophomore class here. It was embarrassing. And why I most definitely could not pass up a chance to cram.

Oh well. At least this meant everyone really was going to Mike's and he wasn't trying to lure me into a secret rape cave or something.

For my entire life, sans the last six months, I had been a straight A student. I had this thing, where, when I was asleep, I'd dream about everything that was coming the next day. I'd see my tests, I'd see what I'd get back on them, and I'd correct myself in real life. Of course, there were some unforeseen consequences. I'd see that Emma Wheeler would throw up on my shoes and I'd sit on the other side of the cafeteria that day, just in time for Joey Stebbins to accidentally dump his lunch on me. That was the unfortunate thing about the dream stuff; I only got one shot to look at what was happening. I had to be vigilant. I couldn't only focus on me, I had to focus on everything on the edges too. Peripherals could not really be peripherals. They had to be just as central than the rest.

And I only had one shot to get things right.

But in the past half a year, I was done. There was no point in relying on these things, these visions, or whatever the hell they were, if they weren't reliable. In the past I had been able to depend on them, and I was always able to pinpoint whatever I'd done that could cause a change. But not anymore.

My parents had dismissed them as nightmares when I was a little girl, but after I'd screamed for days before my mother's car accident, and neither of them believed me, I learned to keep things to myself, and my father began keeping me at a distance once he realized that I knew things.

That's how most people saw me, as the girl who knew things. Not that they bothered to find out how I knew them. I didn't tell people, ever again, about my sight. No one believed me, anyhow.

They didn't work right half of the time anyways, ever since I was a girl I was always seeing this crazy glittering psycho with red eyes who was assaulting me. For some reason, I had never been able to remember any details about his face except for his eyes. Those red eyes, almost glowing as they looked at me the way a lion would examine a field mouse. They used to come infrequently when I was younger, but the nightmare had been recurring more and more often lately. Probably due to some deep rooted psychological issues that I needed to address. 

But, at the moment, all that I needed was to learn math. I sat up until four am that night, trying to decipher my text book, then fell asleep at my desk.

My rest was not permeated with visions of the usual glittering blond nut-job, but instead... Jasper. The boy from history. Who was also glittery. Did I have some sort of as-of-yet undiscovered glitter fetish? Anyways, we were both laying on my bed, and his hand rested on my hip, while I curled into his chest. Tears were streaming down my cheeks.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> You can find me at unfortunate-twihard.tumblr.com


	3. Chapter 3

Was I finally done with this nutty dream deal? Was I having normal teenage girl fantasies?

Wow, my fantasies were pretty tame. I mean, compared to what I'd expect. I always figured that I'd be one of those 'lady in the streets, freak in the sheets' type. Not that I had all that much experience. I'd dated in the past, certainly, but nothing serious. And now I was here with small-town boys who probably couldn't tell Shelley from Stoker, or knew how to structure a sonnet. I wanted a great romance, but here I'd be dealing with Mike Newton and Eric Yorkie. Or maybe Jasper Whatever-His-Last-Name-Was. I'd have to ask.

This morning I was prepared. My hair was well tamed, the humidity wouldn't touch it. I had on a white peasant blouse and skinny jeans. I was made up. I looked lovely.  
Hey, I was having real, honest-to-God dreams. About a boy! I'd noticed he was hot, but I hadn't really been struck by too much else. But if I was having dreams about him, maybe my subconscious was noticing things I wasn't.

I often wondered if that was all any of the dreams were. Maybe I'd had nightmares about my mother's car crash because I'd noticed that the engine was making weird noises. Maybe I could see the weather because I'd overheard the forecast and just didn't recognize it until my brain shoved it out as dreams.

Small comforts like that helped me get through the day, but I knew that they were lies.

I chattered happily about life in Biloxi and asked questions about Forks all morning with my newfound friends, but I was constantly keeping a half-eye out for Jasper.

What an unusual name, Jasper. It sounded like something straight out of another era.

I didn't see him until lunch. He sat with a table of perfect-looking people. Like, air-brushed, straight off the front page of Vogue, people. There was a guy about the size of a truck with dark hair who was laughing and appeared to be teasing a small brunette girl. Well, I say small, but I mean small by normal standards. Not small like me. Or maybe not. Maybe everyone looked small next to that big guy. Anyways, next to her was a bronze-haired guy who was- Oh. Staring right at me. I gave a little wave, and he abruptly turned away, grinning. Ew. Creep. And on his left was a blonde supermodel. Well, she looked like one. Damn, what a babe. Okay, so I may be a bit bisexual. Sue me. She's sexy. I have a thing for blonds. The bronze haired guy said something that made her smirk and the big guy laugh. The brunette put her hand to her mouth to hide her giggle. And Jasper raised an eyebrow and smiled.

"Who's that?" I asked Jessica, trying to sound casual. She followed my gaze and rolled her eyes.

"Don't bother. I know they're eye-candy, but it's a strictly look and do not touch exhibit."

I giggled. "How do you mean?"

"Well, it's totally fucked up. I mean, like, I'm surprised there's not a TV show about them," she began. "They're all adopted. Dr. Cullen and his wife are in their early thirties, and they have five teenagers." I didn't understand what was so fucked up about a foster family, but then she continued, "And they're all involved."

"Wait. None of them are blood related, are they?"

"Emmett and Edward Cullen, the two brunette guys are brothers. The big one's Emmett. The blondes are twins, Rosalie and Jasper Hale. The brunette girl is their little sister, Bella. Bella's with Edward, and Rosalie and Emmett are together."

"So it's not actual incest," I said slowly, as I worked out their family tree. "How long have they all been in the same family? Cause if they all grew up together, that's weird. But if they all met when they were already grown, that's not so bad, is it?"

Everyone at the table stared at me as if I'd just told them I enjoyed ritualistically sacrificing kittens.

"Or... It is?" I offered.

They all nodded.

"And don't even think about making a move on Jasper," Lauren said sharply.

"Well, she's not his sister so he'd never go for her," Eric added.

I frowned. "Wait, did you and him..." I pointed at Lauren.

"No." She said sniffily. "It's just that apparently they're all to good for the peons who don't have famous surgeon fathers."

I sighed. "So, when did he reject you?" I asked.

Lauren glared, Jessica looked shocked, but Mike, Eric, and Angela laughed.

I glanced over again to see the Cullen-Hale table laughing as well. It seemed like they were looking at us.

Weird.

I took a minute to think about the Jasper of my dreams, the one that was all… Sparkly. And nice. At that moment, abruptly, the laughter from the Cullen-Hale table cut off, but I didn’t look back over, afraid that they might notice if I kept staring at them. Instead, I turned back to my apple.

"God, are you anorexic or something?" Lauren asked.

I raised an eyebrow. "No." And took a bite.

That was the truth. I was just a little underweight. I was tiny. I only weighed 102 pounds. But it wasn't because I was anorexic. I had just had a massive breakfast that morning, cereal, fruit, bacon, sausage, pancakes. Aunt Mary had apparently worked through the night, and that was her dinner.

My lunch hour passed, as did my embarrassing Algebra class, and I was back in history. I came in early, and watched my classmates file in. Jasper came in exactly two seconds before the bell rang. He sat next to me but kept his shoulder turned sharply away. I sighed, but said nothing as we took out our notebooks.

After an excruciatingly boring hour-long lecture about Washington’s election, the bell rang. I stood, holding a bunch of my books. And promptly tripped and fell on my ass.

The big guy from lunch, Emmett, (how had I not noticed he was in this class, he really was massive) turned and offered me his hand.

"Thanks," I said. He almost yanked my arm out of its socket helping me up, but I tried to disguise my wince of pain. "I'm Alice."

His hands were freezing. Maybe you have circulatory issues when you're that big?

"Emmett Cullen," he said, helping me gather up my books. "You just moved from Mississippi, right?"

"Yeah, Biloxi."

"Why?"

I'll admit, I may have gone a bit 'deer in the headlights' at that. Sure, people had asked about Mississippi and moving, but no one had actually asked me why. And I wasn't really ready to share.

Luckily, at that moment, the supermodel from lunch appeared in the doorway. She gave me a blood-curdling glare that made me take a few steps back from her boyfriend under the guise of shoving my notebook into my bag, and Emmett said, "I'll see you around, Alice."

"Bye."

He walked out, taking the blonde girl's hand and leaving me alone, the last one in the classroom.

I was making my way across the parking lot when my cell phone rang. I stepped onto the sidewalk to avoid getting squashed, then answered.

"Hello?"

It was Cynthia. She was gasping, sobbing.

"Hey, hey, baby, what's wrong?"

"I- I- Dad s-said that I couldn't c-call you until you were out of school, b-because he didn't want to inter-rupt your classes, but I r-really needed-"

Having been confronted with a crying Cynthia before, I knew that this part could go on for a while.

"Alright, Cynthia, I need you just to take a deep, deep breath, for seven seconds. Then breath out for ten. Okay?"

I was only met with an exhale of air.

"Good! Now do it again."

Finally, she seemed calm enough that I asked, "Alright, what happened?"

She stumbled through her story about how Melissa had been drunk when she'd gotten home from school yesterday, and had apparently sat around for hours verbally abusing Cynthia.

It took me a moment to remind myself that I could not simply run to my sister and help her, and instead only could offer verbal counsel.

"What did Dad say?"

"J-Just that M-Melissa w-was having a h-hard time and that I n-needed to be patient."

I wanted to scream. Of course Melissa was having a hard time, but that didn't give her the right to take it out on my little sister!

"Next time you get home and she's like that, just go to Kathy's. Or Janet's. Or just go for a walk. You don't have to put up with that, Cynthia."  
"I kn-know."

I wanted to hug her, but I had to make due with a simple, "Love you, Cynth."

"I love you too, Ali."

The parking lot had mostly emptied out at that point, so I allowed myself one brief moment. I let out a strangled half-sob and leaned against the brick school wall, my face in my hands.

"Are you alright?"

My head snapped up, and I stumbled back, embarrassed to find my privacy had been disturbed.

The Hale girl... I think her name was Bella, stood several feet away. Her brow was wrinkled with concern.

"I'm fine." I managed a weak smile. "Just a little homesick, is all."

She nodded, convinced. "I grew up in the south too, it's quite an adjustment. Don't worry though, you get used to the vitamin D deficiency."

I nodded, grateful. "Yeah. The weather is really depressing here." I could be in the Bahamas and would still be upset, but she didn't need to know that.

A car horn honked, and Bella turned to see a car full of Cullens and Hales pulling up to the curb. All of them were staring at us. "Well, that's my ride. I hope you feel better." She waved as she got into the car.

I managed a slight wave back as the car pulled away. For some reason, my mind flashed back to my nightmare man’s glowing red eyes.

Despite the fact that the Cullens were the recluses of Forks, two of them had sought out conversations with me. Well, I never did like gossip-at least not the mean kind- so maybe they weren't horrible, just a little shy, and living in a small town where everyone knew everyone and bred rumors about people who were different. Of course, that didn't help my current predicament, but it was nice to know.

I turned and began to slosh my way through the field towards the cutthrough home.

That night I dreamed of baseball and thunderstorms.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I don't actually know how AO3 works so I hope I'm doing this right.


	4. Chapter 4

The next few weeks were exhausting. I was quickly tiring of covering all my cute outfits with my raincoat (even if everyone did keep complimenting me on the bright color, I swear to God everyone else in this town either wore navy or black, it looked like they were on their way to rainy funerals), and I wasn’t sure how much longer my shoes would hold up against the rain. I’d have to go shopping soon.

I also needed to get a job. I was a savvy shopper, but I was going to clear out my bank account soon if I didn’t have any income. I’d snagged the want-ad section of the paper this morning, and had been sneaking peeks at it during my classes. At lunch, Mike told me that his parents were looking for an assistant at their hardware store, and he could put in a good word for me. I couldn’t stop myself from laughing at that.

“Do I really look like I would be any help with hardware?” I gasped out, when asked what was so funny. “I can barely tell the difference between a phillips head and a flat head.”

Mike grinned good-naturedly at that, and I tucked the paper away for the rest of lunch. But I could see a flash of something in Jessica’s eyes whenever she looked at me that afternoon.

Oh.

Well, I couldn’t say that she had nothing to worry about- I hadn’t been here long enough to rule anyone out- but I wondered if I ought to tell her that it was highly unlikely that I’d say yes if Mike asked me out, if only to make her stop glaring at me.

Plus, I didn’t want to do anything to jeopardize my spot in the group of friends I’d made. Jess, Angela, and Lauren had a practically scheduled weekly trip to Port Angeles that I’d been included in since my second week here. Eric and Mike were nice, even if Mike was a little overly friendly, and I’d been doing my best to set up Angela with a guy in my bio lab, Ben Cheney. I had a good spot here, I wasn’t about to blow it because Jess had been bitten by a green eyed monster.

In history, the teacher, Ms. Jordan, announced that we’d be starting projects about the War of 1812, and said that we should all group up with our research partners. I looked around, confused, as everyone began to shuffle seats. Emmett actually came and stood by my chair, as if he was waiting for me to get out.

“Um…” I half raised my hand, and Ms. Jordan seemed to do a double take.

“Oh, right, Alice. In this class, we do research projects in pairs… But you make us an odd number.” She clapped her hands together. “Alright, you will work with Jasper and Emmett.”

I knew I wasn’t imagining the looks of pity from my other classmates, but I simply moved my desk closer to Jasper’s, while Emmett pulled another one near us.

Ms. Jordan passed out a rubric for the project, then had each group draw a slip of paper with a topic on it. Ours was about involvement of the Native American tribes in the war.

When he got the slip, Jasper shot an almost sarcastic grin at Emmett, who was chuckling. I tried not to feel offended, they were brothers, no doubt they’d have in-jokes. I was sure it didn’t have anything to do with me. Or was racist. I was a little worried that it might be racist.

We were supposed to write a paper together and do a ten minute presentation on our topic. It didn’t seem like much work, and we were given the rest of the class to talk to our partners, so I pulled out a notebook and turned to them.

“Alright, we probably want to divide and conquer,” I said, straight to business. “Three categories, the state of the tribal nations before the war, the ones who served with the Americans and the ones who sided with the British, and then the reaction of the Americans after the war. Then we can all transcribe our sections of the paper into a powerpoint or something, and that’ll be that.”

The two boys exchanged a look. “Ah, don’t worry about it, Alice,” Emmett said with a condescending smirk.

“What do you mean, don’t worry about it?” I gave him an incredulous look. “We’ve got two weeks, come on. It’s not that much work if we all do our part.”

“I mean we’ve got it taken care of,” Emmett told me. “We can do the project on our own.”

“And what am I supposed to do, put my name on something I had nothing to do with?” I asked. “Stand up there like an idiot during the presentation? I’m not doing that.”

“Look, you’re new here,” Emmett said. “But we’re not really the group project type.”

I decided not to point out that they’d still be doing a project together, without me. Instead, I turned back to my notebook. “I’ll do the pre-war history, I don’t mind hunting down old documents. Which section do you want?”

“Alice-“

“What Emmett means,” Jasper said, speaking to me for the first time, “Is that we don’t want to leave any portion of our grade up to a girl who ‘can barely tell the difference between a phillips head and a flathead’.”

I flushed. I hadn’t realized that they had heard me say that. And I didn’t have a quick response prepared either, it wasn’t as if people called me stupid every day.

“Sorry,” Emmett said. “Don’t worry, though, we always get A’s. Your grade is safe in our hands.”

I sharply turned back to my notebook. Now I understood why Lauren was so bitter when she first told me about Jasper. It wasn’t because he had rejected her. It was because he was an ass.

Actually, they were a pair of asses. Emmett seemed friendly, but it wasn’t as if he was sticking up for me. He and his brother had overheard a part of a joking conversation and had turned it into the assumption that I was stupid. Screw them.

The more I thought about it, the angrier I got. From the corner of my eye, I could see Jasper smiling. Stupid, stuck up, arrogant jerk!

I didn’t speak a word for the rest of class, even as the people around me devolved into normal conversation, but I was feeling more and more frustrated as I thought back on what had occurred. When the bell rang, I was the first one out the door. I didn’t stop by my locker for my books, or to talk to Mike, who was fighting against a sea of students to make his way towards me. I almost sprinted out of the building, and hurtled into the woods towards the path home.

Once I was away, I felt the anger begin to dissipate. Instead, I just felt an overwhelming urge to cry. I knew it was stupid. He was just a dumb boy, they both were. But Emmett had seemed nice the other day, and so had Bella. I had hoped, maybe foolishly, that I might be able to make friends with them. I certainly appreciated the friendliness of the locals, but they seemed just a touch less… Substantive. However, I’d take shallow over just plain mean any day.

I spent the afternoon putting together my resume. It was embarrassingly lacking. A summer as a camp counselor, a few weeks filling in as a secretary in my friend’s stead when she broke her wrist, hell I even threw in the fact that I was CPR certified… I also added the fact that I was in AP courses in high school. It felt like bragging, but it filled up some space.

Then I checked the bus schedules and searched online until I was reasonably certain I had found every place that was within walking distance from a bus stop that was hiring (all six of them), printed off my resume and the applications, and put them all together, until I had a stack of envelopes ready to be mailed. I set them on my desk and dug around in my back pack for my biology textbook, so I could start on my stupid lab report.

My biology textbook which I had left in my locker when I had stormed out of the school in a fit of rage.

I checked the time. The school would probably still be open for clubs and such. I could get back in time to duck in and grab my stuff. I drearily eyed the wet, grey sky through my window, but decided that a failing grade wasn’t worth staying indoors for, so I hopped up and pulled my coat and shoes back on.

The walk was long, but instead of depressing me, the cool weather and misting rain cheered me up. I loved that sort of weather, where you can feel the flush rising on your skin, cool but not actually chilly, the sort of weather that makes you feel alive… It’s just what I needed, after sitting around indoors feeling sorry for myself.

When I got to the school, the football team was just getting out of practice. I walked in a crowd of players towards building seven, where my locker backed up against the gym. I stopped short when I saw Emmett Cullen, Bella Hale, and Jasper Hale standing at the end of the hallway. One of the football players bumped into me, and I quickly stepped aside to let him pass. I couldn’t hear much of what they were saying, but the hallways were echoey and I could pick up a few words.

“…Don’t like it either, but…”

“We all have to be on the same page, no one talks to her…”

“He said she’s not even a little apprehensive, it’s probably for the best…”

“…At least she doesn’t smell good…”

“…Get over it, I’m sure she’s resilient…”

Behind me, a throat cleared, and I turned to see Edward Cullen standing behind me. His siblings all immediately looked our way, and somehow I got the feeling that I was the ‘she’ that they were referring to. Bella automatically smiled at me, Emmett looked to the side, and Jasper’s face remained impassive.

I said nothing, and pretended I hadn’t been caught eavesdropping. Instead, I made my way down the hall towards my locker. To preemptively stop any scowls, I purposefully kept my mind on my Biology assignment as I yanked my locker door open. I did my best not to look at the Cullen-Hale clan, but I had an unerring feeling that they were looking at me. I shoved the books that I needed into my bag and slammed my locker door shut, too hard. It didn’t catch, and instead sprang back open. I could hear Emmett’s loud guffaw, and a few chuckles that I couldn’t place, and with that it became impossible to convince myself that they weren’t looking at me.

Ears burning, I shut my locker door more carefully, and turned to walk back down the hallway. I was careful to keep my pace purposeful but still moderate; Alice Brandon was no one’s fool, and I refused to be cowed by these rude strangers.

By the time I got home, I had convinced myself that I’d just ignore them, the assholes. I would show them who could be resilient! I would-

What had Jasper meant when he said ‘she doesn’t smell good’?

The next morning, I woke up late and was scrambling to get out the door. I practically sprinted to the school, a task that is not all so easy in rain boots, but still came in a second after the final bell.

“Sit down, Ms. Brandon.” I appreciated that I wouldn’t have to squelch all the way back to the office to get a tardy slip, and Jessica pulled out my chair for me as I approached my seat. I looked to the back of the class, where Bella Hale sat. I knew, from school gossip, that this was the only class that she didn’t have with Edward, and therefore was the only class where she sat alone. Usually she would smile at me when I came in- well, she would when anyone came in- but today she steadfastly avoided my gaze, even when I tried to catch her eye.

All right, apparently all the Cullen clan had decided that I was to be avoided like the plague. I didn’t even know Bella, aside from that one brief conversation; I didn’t know why I was feeling hurt.

Well, I did actually. Since that first night, I’d had dreams. Most of them were of me and Jasper (sans the glitter, thank God) but the others were scattered throughout them as well. I could see myself shopping with Bella, riding dirt bikes with Emmett, watching Edward play piano, even a few of me joking with Rosalie… I’d also envisioned their parents, Carlisle and Esme. I had no idea whether or not those visions were accurate, since I didn’t even know the actual names of the Cullen parents, but the dreams all had the same ethereal quality, and I had hoped… It didn’t matter what I’d hoped.

‘You can’t change your situation, Alice,’ I told myself, as I pulled out The Great Gatsby. ‘Just the way you feel about it.’

And from that day on, I decided that it wasn’t that the Cullens were ignoring me, no, it was that I was ignoring the Cullens. And I did my best. I didn’t look back into Bella’s corner in English, or to where she and Edward were snuggled up in my Biology class. I made friends with a few people in my History class and talked to them, steadfastly ignoring Jasper and Emmett. We moved on from the War of 1812, and our project had gone off fine. The day we were supposed to present, Emmett had slipped me notecards with the points I was supposed to present on and we all got A’s. Not that I deserved mine.


	5. Chapter 5

October turned into November, and I was able to adjust to the same mentality the other students here all seemed to share: The Cullens and the Hales were not a part of our school. Sure, they were here, but they were absolutely inconsequential to everyone but each other. After a few days, even the dreams stopped. I had no reason to ever think of them again.

Until Thanksgiving.

Aunt Mary had asked me if I was planning on going home for the holidays. Truthfully, the answer was no, but I had pretended to consider, if only to make my exile from  
Biloxi feel more like a choice rather than a matter of fact. Then I told her that I would like to stay in Forks, if that was okay with her.

Two things happened the week of Thanksgiving; both of them involved me getting bloody.

The first happened in gym class, of course. It was the day before Thanksgiving (break here was only Thursday and Friday, I would hardly even have a chance to get to Biloxi before I’d have to turn around. At least, that’s what I’d been telling anyone who asked if I was going home for the holiday), and the gym teachers had decided that a friendly game intramural of kickball wouldn’t be so bad. It still overcast and damp out, but not raining, so while the freshmen and sophomores squared off in the gym, the juniors and seniors all trooped onto the field outside. The ground was still wet and squishy, and the air was damp and chilly. Juniors were kicking first.

I was in line between Mike and Eric Yorkie. They were both trying to talk to me at the same time, about separate things, and glared at the other whenever I answered his questions. I knew that Mike thought I was attractive, but the Eric thing was new. 

I knew what it was, though. I was the shiny new toy. Not much changed in Forks, so my being here hadn’t lost its sense of novelty. It would fade. At least, I hoped so.

For my part, I was trying to ignore the Hales. Emmett, Jasper, and Rosalie all had gym this period, and were fielding with the rest of the seniors. They were all supremely athletic (something I found supremely annoying) and their team was taking advantage of that, they were each on a base. This was another anomaly from Mississippi; everyone here seemed to get into the game. Back home, you’d have about three quarters of the class hiding in the back of the line, trying to avoid going up to kick, or standing way out in the field, praying that the ball wouldn’t be kicked their way. Instead, everyone was keeping score, people were hooting and hollering and carrying on, everyone ran for the ball, there were cheers and jeers and exclamations with every play. With three notable exceptions. Emmett, Rosalie, and Jasper were all very quiet. Oh, sure, they were good. Once a fielder got the ball to them, there was no stopping them. They could all throw with unerring accuracy, and they never fumbled or missed a catch. But they seemed bored with the whole thing. They didn’t talk, they barely looked at the game, they didn’t even have to yell to get each other’s attention, they just… Threw the ball.

But I wasn’t thinking about them. I’d made that resolution, and I planned on sticking with it. I wasn’t going to care.

What I was going to care about was the fact that Mike and Eric were still trying to hit on me. I mean, there’s a point where it’s just no longer flattering. Maybe I was being too nice? I didn’t have much time to contemplate, we’d actually managed to get two runners on base, and Eric was up. We’d learned early on that you had to kick way outfield, the second the ball got to the Emmett or the Hales, the jig was up.

“Wish me luck,” Eric told me, winking, as he moved into position.

I smiled halfheartedly and gave him a thumbs up. He beamed… And missed the ball as it rolled right by him.

“Strike one!”

Mike snorted derisively behind me, but Eric managed to kick it properly the second time. And then the bases were loaded, and I was up to kick.

Wonderful.

I missed the first two times, but as the pitcher squared up and rolled it a third, I actually managed a kick. It went far and wide into the field, and I bolted. This was different. Back home, you avoided the ball. Only the super competitive, jocky, fuckboys actually participated, but here, you played. You did your best to win. And it was a little bit… Fun.

I wasn’t really paying attention to what was happening in the field, the only thing I was focused on was running towards first base, when-

SMACK!

I was down.

It took me a few minutes to realize what had happened. Tyler Crowley had thrown wide and instead of the ball falling into Jasper’s waiting hands, it had instead deigned to give me a bloody nose. He had run across the field, apologizing profusely to me, and most of the two grades had conglomerated around us as well. Nothing like a bloody face to draw a crowd.

“Okay, okay!” Coach Warren yelled, waving the crowd away. “Give her room to breathe, come on!” I sat up, touching my tender face, pinching my bleeding nose. “Lean forward, Alice, come on…” Coach Warren had me tilt forward and helped me to my feet. “Hale!” She called, and my head jerked up. She was looking at Jasper. “Walk Alice to the nurse’s office.”

I glanced to the side to see Rosalie and Emmett each looking murderous, before I turned to see Jasper. He looked troubled, but he wasn’t giving me the same glare that his siblings were, so I didn’t shy away when he walked towards me.

I, for my part, was doing my best at brushing the mud off of my legs. There was no hope for my uniform, I was coated in long streaks of muck and grass. I barely noticed as Mike Newton called out that he would walk me instead, or that Coach Warren told him to get back in line to kick and keep the teams even.

Jasper and I walked in silence for a minute, before he finally spoke. “Are you okay?”

“Well, still bleeding,” I reported, my hand still pinching my nose. “What about you, how’s your day going?”

He chuckled. “Not too bad, comparatively.” He paused, appeared to be considering something, before he asked, “What are you doing for break?”

“My aunt is having people over,” I reported. “What about you?”

“My family is going out of town,” He told me. We had reached the administration building, and he held the door open for me.

“Thanks. Where are you going?”

At that moment, the nurse rushed over, catching site of me all bloody. “What happened?”

“Kickball accident,” Jasper said. The nurse handed me paper towels to hold to my bloody face.

“Okay, sit down sweetie, we’ll take care of you.”

The next few minutes went by with the nurse bustling around, helping me wipe the mud and blood off of my arms and legs, although we both agreed that my uniform was a lost cause.

“Well, I’ll just keep you here until the bleeding stops, then we can get you out to the locker room and you can shower off the rest of this. Mr. Hale, do you mind waiting until she’s ready to go?” The nurse asked. “Don’t want her passing out on her way back to class, do we?”

“Of course not,” Jasper said calmly. I was surprised, I had figured that as soon as he dumped me here he’d be rushing to get back, especially considering the black look his siblings had been giving me when we left. The nurse went back into her inner office, leaving me seated on a plastic blue chair and Jasper leaning against the wall. It was so unfair, no one should look that good in a gym uniform.

“You don’t have to wait,” I told him. “I know your team is probably floundering now that the dynamic trio has been knocked down to a duo.”

His lips quirked in a half-smile. “And what would they think if I came back without you? I’d be accused of having buried your body out by the back buildings.”

“And then they’d say I was resurrected,” I said. “I could really work the whole ‘Jesus’ angle too, see if it could get me off of working on Black Friday.”

“Where do you work?” Jasper asked, chuckling.

“Sweet Dreams, that bakery on Main,” I said. “It’s not like Forks is exactly a bustling Black Friday destination, but my boss is certain that there will be absolute hordes of shoppers who will stop in for doughnuts and cupcakes to keep their strength up.”

Jasper winced sympathetically. “How late do you have to stay on?”

“Oh, I’m not actually working the counter, I have to get there by four am to start baking so we can be ready to open at six. I get to leave then.”

“That sucks,” he said. “I’m sorry.”

At that moment, Edward Cullen burst in. Jasper and I both looked up in surprise, but Jasper’s expression quickly became one of annoyance and maybe even… anger? The nurse came out from her back office. “Mr. Cullen!” She exclaimed.

“I have a headache,” he ground out, his eyes on Jasper.

“Oh! Well, let me get you a glass of water, most headaches are just dehydration anyways,” she said, turning around.

I shrank into my seat, the looks that Edward and Jasper were shooting at each other were terrifying. I didn’t know what was going on, but my mind flashed back to the day I’d heard Jasper, Emmett, and Bella talking, when they’d said something about how none of them could talk to me… Had Jasper broken some unspoken rule in their family, by taking me to the nurse? I almost wished that I could speak up on his behalf, explain that Coach Warren had basically demanded he take me, but I kept quiet. I mentally willed my nose to stop bleeding, and pulled the paper towels away to check whether or not I was successful. I looked back up to see Jasper with a hand on Edward’s arm, and Edward’s black eyes boring into me with absolute loathing. I quickly returned my hand to my face.

You could have cut the tension with a knife, and I felt a bubble in fear rise in me. I didn’t know what I had done, but clearly Edward Cullen was plotting my untimely demise. Alright, maybe I was being a touch overdramatic, but there was something with this guy. Well, there was something with this family. Edward took the cup of water that the nurse handed him but didn’t drink, his eyes boring into Jasper’s head. Jasper rolled his own eyes and looked away. The nurse looked back and forth, clearly as unnerved as I was.

I pulled the napkins away from my nose again and carefully inspected them. The blood on them was mostly dry, so I touched my face. “I stopped bleeding,” I told the nurse with relief. 

She nodded and gave me a half smile. “Alright, honey, go on then.” She looked at Edward and timidly suggested, “Do you want to drink your water?”

I hopped up and basically ran out of the room, back outside, Jasper dutifully at my heels. I hesitated for a moment, but finally asked, “Is everything okay?”

“Of course it is,” he said, frowning at me. “Why wouldn’t it be?”

“Your brother… Seemed upset.”

Jasper nodded. “It’s… It’s nothing to do with you, the two of us had an argument earlier.”

Suddenly, a sense of calm washed over me. I smiled at Jasper, who grinned back after a moment’s hesitation.

“Hale! Get back out on the field! Brandon, are you alright?” We both turned to Coach Warren, who was walking towards us.

“Yes ma’am, she is, but the nurse said to be on the safe side she shouldn’t play for the rest of the afternoon,” Jasper told her.

“Alright. Brandon, hit the showers.”

When I got out of the locker room, my hair still a little damp, Tyler Crowley was waiting outside.

“Oh, hey,” I said, looking around at the otherwise empty gym. “Isn’t there still five more minutes in class?”

“Yeah. I just wanted to apologize for, you know, hitting you in the face.”

“Oh! That’s okay,” I told him. He smiled at me.

“Well, that’s not all I wanted to do,” he said. “I was wondering if you had a date to the winter formal.”

“The winter formal? The one next month?”

“Yeah.” He grinned at me, and I noticed dimples that I hadn’t before.

“Um… Tyler, I’m sorry…”

“Yeah?”

I bit my lip. “I don’t think I can go with you to winter formal,” I said.

“Why?”

Inspiration struck. “It’s right before break, I just haven’t planned anything out yet. I think I’m leaving to go back home before then.”

“Oh.” He looked deflated. “Well, if you can stay in town, you totally should. I could show you a good time.”

“I’ll keep that in mind.”

Suddenly, the doors into the building slammed open, and the two classes of muddy and grassy people burst in, chattering loudly. Tyler was carried along with the crowd towards the locker room. It actually almost looked like Emmett Cullen shoved him a bit. At any rate, I pulled my hand over my mouth hide my grin, and caught Rosalie’s eyes boring a hole into my head. I internally sighed, then waved.

“Happy Thanksgiving Rosalie!”

She scowled at me and stomped towards the locker room. I rolled my eyes and hoisted my backpack higher up onto my shoulders.

I got through most of the rest of the day without incident. When I got to History, however, Jasper pulled out my chair for me.

“Thanks,” I said, giving him a puzzled smile as I slid in.

“Your nose alright?” he asked me.

“Yeah,” I nodded. “Who won?” At his quizzical look, I added, “At kickball?”

“Oh!” He frowned for a moment, and a cute little crease appeared between his eyebrows. “I have no idea,” he told me, laughing. I joined in, and suddenly my chest was filled with a sort of mischievous, roiling cheer. When our laughter abated, I noticed Ms. Jordan standing by the board, giving us a bemused smile. There were also a few of our classmates looking at us, including Tyler Crowley.

Huh. I’d never noticed that he was in this class before.

I flashed Ms. Jordan a smile, and she sighed and began her lecture. As I bent down to take my notebook out of my backpack, Emmet Cullen leaned forward and whacked  
Jasper on the back of his head.


	6. Chapter 6

The next day, Aunt Mary woke me up early to help with the cooking. I spent my morning mostly on dessert patrol (Aunt Mary said that since I worked in a bakery, I’d probably know better than her when it came to pastries), baking pies and cookies and making whipped cream. When I pulled the last tray out of the oven, I had been fully prepared to flop down on the couch and watch that Law and Order marathon that’s always playing on holidays. But when Aunt Mary directed me to start boiling water, I moved to potato duty. And so on. I had just finished putting the sweet potato casserole in the oven, when the visitors arrived.

“Your doorbell’s broken!” I looked out the window towards the front door, and saw a man in a wheelchair with what looked like his son at the door. I ran across the kitchen and threw the front door open just as the man in the wheelchair began to yell, “Mary, get your raggedy ass dow- You’re not Mary.”

“Nope!” I said brightly as the man cleared his throat and his son laughed. “You must be Billy Black and… ah… Jacob, right? I’m Alice, Mary’s niece. Come in! Aunt Mary’s just getting more of the good china from the basement.” I stepped back, and Jacob wheeled his father over the threshold. “I can take that,” I said, seeing the dish of something Billy had in his lap.

“It’s a corn casserole,” Jacob told me.

“Thanks,” I set the casserole on the counter. “So…” 

I cast around for conversation topics when I heard Aunt Mary call out in a friendly voice, “Is that Billy Black, you son of a bitch?”

“Haha, it sure is you lazy old bastard! God, I haven’t seen you in forever!”

I raised my eyebrows. The two were jovial, Aunt Mary bending down to hug him, both of them trading barbs and laughing. She certainly seemed… Friendlier than I’d ever seen her before. Maybe this was how Aunt Mary did friendship?

Things had been cold in the house. Not that Aunt Mary was mean to me, or anything, but I could tell that she was used to living by herself, and was in no hurry to adjust her life to make room for me. More often than not, I was scrounging my own meals from whatever she’d felt like getting at the supermarket; we barely ever ate together. She didn’t expect me to check in with her or let her know where I was, it was almost like I was living on my own. I answered to no one. That was a shocking revelation, one that occurred to me one weekend when I was out with Jessica, Lauren, and Angela. We’d gone shopping at Port Angeles, and had decided to see a late movie, that we hadn’t realized was around four hours long. Jess had dropped me off around 2 am, and I had expected to see Aunt Mary sitting up. But she wasn’t.

The next morning, I was prepared to get screamed at and grounded, like Jess, Lauren, and Angela had already texted me they had been, but Aunt Mary didn’t say anything. And it was after that I started noticing.

She didn’t ask me how my day was. She didn’t ask about school or if I’d like her to pick anything up for me at the store. She really only talked when I asked her questions.  
I was on my own. And I was really okay with it, I was. I figured that was just the way she was. But now here she was, talking and laughing and smiling. Just not with me.

“Alice, could you set the table please?” Aunt Mary asked, bringing me back to the moment and gesturing over her shoulder to where she’d set the dishes on the counter.

“Gotcha,” I said, picking up the plates. Just another item to add to the list of ‘Things That I Will Not Allow to Bother Me’.

“Jacob, give her a hand,” Billy called.

I led Jacob into the dining room, holding the plates, and he followed me with a handful of silverware.

“I don’t think I’ve seen you at school,” I said, laying down plates.

“Yeah, I go to school on the rez. That’s how my Dad knows your Aunt,” Jacob explained. “He’s been helping her with her book for a few years now.”

“Damn,” I said, a touch impressed. “I didn’t know she’d been working on it for that long.” At Jacob’s quizzical look, I added, “We sort of lost touch for a while, after my mom died.”

“Oh!” He gave me a soft look. “My mom passed away too, when I was younger.”

I smiled softly. “Sorry about your mom.”

“Sorry about yours.”

We set the table in silence, before I heaved a sigh and said, “God, that got morbidly depressing real fast.”

He laughed, and we were able to move the conversation along. We ended up back in the kitchen, and Aunt Mary instructed me to chop up the carrots for the salad while   
she carried the remaining dishes to the dining room, insisting that Billy and Jacob sit back and enjoy their beer and soda, respectively. Jacob was standing by me, telling me an absolutely hilarious story about the time his sisters decided to practice shaving on his eyebrows, when-

“Oh, fuck!” I looked at the gash that I’d accidentally chopped into my finger. “Uh oh.”

“Shit!” Jacob swore, grabbing a handful of paper towels and handing them to me. “Uh…Keep that elevated.”

Aunt Mary ran into the room, and examined my hand closely. “Okay,” she said in a pseudo-calm voice. “You need stitches.”

I chanced a glance and- 

“Is that bone?” Jacob asked. “Oh, sick.”

“Uh, so I guess that means I should go to the hospital or so-“

“No!” I looked up to see Billy in the doorway, a panicked look on his face. “No, you can’t go to the hospital.”

The blood had already soaked through the paper towels. This was much worse than my bloody nose yesterday.

“Why not?” Aunt Mary looked almost… Eager, maybe that was the word, as she asked him.

Billy swallowed, and Jacob rolled his eyes, handing me more paper towels.

“You’d be waiting there for hours since it’s the holiday. But my friend, Sue Clearwater, is a nurse. She can fix you right up. Jacob can drive you to her house, it’s not that long of a trip.”

Aunt Mary looked a little deflated, but nodded. “That’s a good idea, if you don’t mind giving her a ride, Jacob.”

“Of course!” Jacob looked a little too eager at the prospect. I would have rolled my eyes, except unlike Mike or Eric, he seemed to actually be interested in me as a whole, not just my breasts, so I would just… Wait and see. Maybe I’d dream about him tonight instead.

He helped me out to the car, an old, rusty pickup truck, and even opened the door for me. I was about to ask him to finish the story about his sisters, to distract me, when he started the engine. Which was deafening.

“Sorry about the noise!” Jacob shouted over the engine. “This thing’s older than me!”

“That’s alright!” I shouted back. “How long is the trip?” I had a fresh wad of paper towels pressed to my hand, but blood was already starting to seep through.

“Just a few minutes!” He told me. He was looking a little frantic for someone who had been exclaiming over my gaping hand wound a few minutes ago. The truck squealed as he accelerated.

“You just ran a stop sign!”

“What?”

“Never mind!” I double checked that my seatbelt was fastened as we zoomed onto La Push.

A few minutes later, we pulled up in front of a smallish house with a few cars already parked in front of it. Jacob hopped out and ran around to my side to open the door for me. Really, though, I did need the hand down, since this truck was big.

And I was small.

We ran up to the door, and Jacob knocked. It was yanked open by a pretty girl with the same dark hair and olive skin as Jacob. She looked disappointed once she saw it was us.

“Hey, Leah, is your Mom here?” Jacob asked.

“She’s cooking. Why, what’s up?”

“This is Mary’s niece. She needs stitches.”

Leah nodded. “Come in.”

The house was small but comfortable. There were delicious smells wafting throughout it, and about a dozen people milling about. Jacob directed me to a couch, and a minute later an older woman came out. “Hi, Alice,” she said. “I’m Sue. Why don’t you come into the back room with me?”

I stood up and followed her. She stopped by a tiny bathroom real quick, and came back with a small box in her hand. “I don’t have any anesthetic, so this will hurt,” she warned me, taking my hand and wiping it down with an alcohol swab.

“Mm hm.” I winced, the alcohol stung. “I didn’t know nurses did stitches.” I was looking for some sort of distraction.

“RNs don’t, but I’m a nurse practitioner. I work at a clinic in Port Angeles, not at a hospital,” she explained. “That’s why I have suture kits at home. You can’t take supplies from a hospital, but at the clinic they’ve seen me bring in Seth and Leah to get stitched up enough times that they’re fine with me bringing home a few kits.”

I nodded. “I met Leah, but Seth is…?”

“My son. He’s thirteen. Hero worships Jacob, so he’s probably thrilled you two stopped by. And how’s Thanksgiving at the Brandon household?”

I gave her a quick rundown of the day so far, figuring if I kept talking, I wouldn’t notice how much my hand hurt. Sue was obliging; she asked me questions and didn’t interrupt when I started jabbering.

“So you’re a Brandon, and your aunt’s a Brandon, but she’s your mother’s sister?”

“Yeah. My parents had the same last name. That’s actually how they met; when they were in college, their professor insisted on seating them alphabetically by last name, so they were beside each other.”

“That’s so sweet.”

And so on.

“It’s good that you came here,” Sue told me, once she was about halfway done. “You can feel free to stop by, any time. Forks hospital doesn’t have anything on me.”

Sue walked me out once we were done, my hand bandaged, and I was introduced to the rest of the gang. Leah, the girl I’d met, was glued to her boyfriend, Sam. There were a few cousins and such milling around the house, including one very pregnant lady who I was a little afraid was going to give birth right there, she was so big. Seth, Sue’s son, was talking Jacob’s ear off, as she’d predicted. Her husband, Harry, was boiling a turkey outside with a few other men, talking about fishing or something.

“All fixed,” I told Jacob, touching his arm. He looked up and grinned at me.

“Awesome.”

“You two, sit, I’ll get you drinks.”

“Oh no, that’s not-“

“Yeah, it’s fine, we need to-“

“I insist! Alice needs to refuel, she lost a fair bit of blood.”

Jacob gave me a sheepish smile, and I sighed and sat next to him on the couch. I wasn’t sure what to make of the way his arm was spread along the back of the couch, or   
how it almost made it look like it was around my shoulders. “What were you two talking about?”

“School! Jacob was giving me some tips for freshman year,” Seth told me. “I’m in eighth grade.”

“God, freshman year,” I sighed. “That’s always a train wreck.”

“Jacob sounds like he likes it,” Seth said defensively.

I was about to say that Jacob clearly didn’t know what he was talking about, when the full implications of Seth’s statement caught up. Likes it. ‘Likes’ was a present tense   
word. “How old are you?”

Jacob looked at me sideways. “Fourteen. You?”

“Seventeen!”

Jacob’s eyes grew wide. “I’m about to be fifteen,” he added quickly.

“I’m still seventeen!”

Seth began to snicker, but I was hit by another shocking revelation. “Oh my God, you drove us here!”

By the time we were ready to go, after I’d drunk enough juice so that Sue was convinced I wasn’t going to pass out, I had become thoroughly disillusioned of the idea of romance. Where was the justice? I had boys who were into me, yeah, but Mike Newton and Eric Yorkie seemed to only really like the fact that I was a girl that they hadn’t known since kindergarten, Tyler Crowley had some sort of guilt complex thing, but I didn’t want to date a guy who only noticed me because he almost broke my nose. Or who used more hair product than me. Jasper Hale was just… Strange, there was no other word for the hot and cold way he’d treated me. Or rather, lukewarm and cold, it wasn’t like one conversation was the same thing as us falling madly in love.

And then there was Jacob Black, who seemed sweet and funny and definitely way the hell too young for me. But really, it was almost enough to make a girl give up.

But there was something else that was bothering me. 

“Hey, Jacob?” I had to shout over the engine, but he looked over.

“Yeah?”

“How come your Dad was weird about me coming to the hospital? I mean, it was nice of him to tell me about Sue, but it’s not that big of a deal.”

“Oh, he’s just kind of weird about the hospital. A lot of the people in the tribe have been boycotting since Dr. Cullen started working there.”

“Why?”

“Well…” Jacob gave me a sideways look. “It’s sort of a secret.”

“Blood pact stuff?” I asked lightly, trying to act like I wasn’t super interested. Which I definitely was.

I could tell Jacob was deliberating. “There’s sort of a legend.”

“About the Cullens?”

“About… Their kind.” He was giving me a sideways look.

“Their kind?” Something gave me the feeling that I was going to have to drag this out of him one word at a time.

“Okay, if you want the real story… I’ll tell you after dinner.” He grinned at me, and I couldn’t help but grin back. Even though he was three years younger than me, he had a certain charm.

Dinner was fine, more than fine, even, but I was barely able to taste it. A few neighbors and some of Aunt Mary’s coworkers (apparently she lectured at Peninsula, the community college in La Push, who knew?) came over too, while I was getting stitched up. At least the massive piles of food made more sense. I didn’t pay much attention to the conversation, but even I had to ask, “So… Thanksgiving doesn’t… It’s not an awkward… I don’t know how to phrase this in a culturally sensitive way.”

The three of them laughed. “We’re not actually celebrating the pilgrims,” Aunt Mary told me.

“They were… Not great,” Billy began, before Jacob interrupted.

“The pilgrims were assholes,” he told me flatly, to the amusement of most of the table.

“But the thing is,” Billy continued smoothly, “They weren’t the ones who came up with Thanksgiving. Thanksgiving is supposed to be a celebration of the autumn harvest   
of the Wampanoag tribe. White people didn’t come up with it.” Billy smiled at me.

I nodded. “Alright.” Aunt Mary reached out and squeezed my arm, and gave me a smile.

Well, now I felt a little better since I knew we weren’t just in the midst of some horrifying, cultural appropriation-y mess. Probably.

Dinner was not just fine, but also long. Very long. And I knew I was being horrible and ungrateful and all sorts of awful things. But dammit, I hated secrets. And although I had promised to not care about the Cullen family, I felt like something had changed after yesterday. So maybe I could put that promise on hold until I got back to school and saw if he- if they still hated me.

I got my chance after we finished the main meal. Aunt Mary said something about waiting for our dinner to settle before dessert, so I suggested that Jacob and I go for a walk. Aunt Mary gave me a strange look as we went, but she didn’t say anything, and we ducked out.

I didn’t want to seem over eager, so I chattered on for a bit about school and my job, and Jacob seemed happy to oblige me, in this, at least. And then, trying to sound   
cavalier, I asked, “So, what was up with the Cullen thing?”

He seemed hesitant. “I’m really not supposed to tell.”

I nodded. “Of course, I don’t want to get you in trouble.” Jacob nodded, before I added, “But I promise that whatever you do, it can’t be worse than what I’m imagining.”

“Okay.” Jacob glanced around, then began speaking in a low voice. “So, the Quileute people have a legend about where we came from. That we’re descended from wolves, and the wolves are our brothers. It’s actually against tribal law to kill a wolf.” He paused, and I had to nod encouragingly to urge him to continue. “And there are the stories about the wolf’s enemies.”

“Wolves have enemies?”

“The wolves who turn into men do. The cold ones.” He paused for dramatic affect, but I just gave him a blank look. I didn’t see what was scary about people with poor circulation. Or why his Dad didn’t want me going to the hospital.

“The cold ones are monsters that hunt humans and drink their blood. Your kind calls them vampires.”

Jacob stopped walking at this point, and I paused next to him. He looked like he wasn’t going to say anything else, and I asked, “What does that have to do with J- the Cullens?”

“Well, a century ago, it’s said that the pack, the wolf pack… Apparently we have a pack of protector werewolves, or something,” he admitted bashfully, “Ran into a family of cold ones who weren’t like the others. They drank animal blood, and they didn’t kill humans. They made a treaty with the pack that so long as they stayed off our land, and didn’t hurt the humans, we’d leave them alone. Not expose them to the palefaces, and all that. After a while, they moved on, but it’s said that the Cullens…” Here he trailed off again, apparently hesitant to break the treaty. I had a pretty good guess though.

“They’re the children of the cold ones?”

Jacob shook his head. “They’re the same ones.”


	7. Chapter 7

I was not ready for Black Friday. Try as I might, I couldn’t sleep after Jacob’s story. At first I’d laughed at his attempt to be dramatic, shook my head, and decided that a scary story wasn’t worth pursuing, so I should go back to the original plan of waiting to see if Jasper said anything to me when we got back on Monday, but then I started to think about it.

Cold ones.

Emmett’s hands had felt unnaturally cold the day he helped me with my books. That was hardly worth noting, I knew, but I could feel the hairs on my arm stand on end when I though about it. Could the Cullens-

It was too freaky.

So I buried myself in flour and chocolate chips and let the soothing, repetitive motions of stirring and pouring overwhelm me as the bakery filled with the smell of pastries, even as I struggled to keep myself awake. I did my best to keep my mind blank, and reminded myself that vampires do not exist and this was probably just like when I was a kid and watched Saw and wouldn’t leave the house for three days because I was scared Jigsaw would come get me or something. I was letting a scary story control my   
life, and that was not cool. Or conducive to my efforts to ignore the Cullens.

But still.

Once my shift was over, I went back home and slept for a few hours, took a shower, gorged myself on leftovers, and did homework.

Rinse and repeat for the next two days.

Work, homework, food, and sleep. I didn’t talk to anyone except a few customers the entire time. And to be honest, it felt pretty good. I felt… Freer. Self reliant. Things were okay. So long as I didn’t think about anything except what was happening in the moment, but that’s fine. 

Everything was fine.

Except now my dreams had returned, and in them…

‘We’re not like the rest of our kind, we don’t kill humans.’

‘I reach out to touch you once, just once, unthinkingly, and I could crush your skull.’

‘Do you know how easy it would be for me to kill you?’

‘We’re dangerous, Mary Alice.’

But that wasn’t the worst part. No, the worst part came at three am on Monday morning.

‘I love you, Alice.’

After that, how was I supposed to sleep at all? At least this was enough to push the thoughts of the supernatural out of my head. I mean, aside from the psychic dream thing, but at least I had something to distract me from the worries that the boy who could potentially be in love with me was actually a bloodsucking demon.

So for once, I was up early enough to make breakfast. Or rather, to heat up leftover apple pie. Hey, it’s fruit. It’s good for you. I spent a good part of my morning watching the rain out the window, though. God, it was all so loud, the sound of it battering against the windows. Loud enough to give me a headache. How had I not noticed it before? How had I managed to sleep through it in the past? How had I managed to walk through it every day? I bit my lip, debating with myself for a moment, then pulled out my phone and shot off a text.

Fifteen minutes later, Angela pulled up to the curb in front of Aunt Mary’s house, and I ran out to her car.

“Thanks for this. I normally wouldn’t ask it just… Seems to be coming down a lot harder.”

“Yeah,” she nodded. “Today is kinda gloomy.” We were quiet for most of the drive, which I was grateful for. I was lost in thought, prodding at the painful considerations   
on my mind the way I used to poke at loose teeth. Sure, the things on my mind ached, but it wasn’t like I could just leave them alone.  
“I’ll see you at lunch?” She asked, when we pulled up.

“Yeah, definitely.”

—

But lunch rolled around, and I didn’t want to see anyone. I holed up in the library, and ruminated on this. I’d dreamed Jasper had told me he loved me. And in that   
moment, I’d felt it clearly. I had felt love, love more powerful than I’d ever thought possible.

Then again, I’d once dreamt I could run at light speed, which was another thing I’d never thought possible. So dreams were not necessarily an indicator of my reality, no   
matter how accurate they could be.

And Bella Hale still didn’t look at me when I came into English this morning. She and Edward didn’t even glance up in Bio. This wasn’t vampiric behavior, just that of teenagers who were snubbing someone. I didn’t want to go to my afternoon classes. I didn’t want to know if the conversation I’d had with Jasper had just been some anomaly, or if he really was still talking to me. I didn’t know which would be worse.

I knew this wasn’t healthy. It’s bad enough to get wrapped up in your friends, to care so much about them that it can prevent you from functioning when they treat you   
coldly, but to reach that point with perfect strangers… This was bad. And I knew that it was because of my dreams, because I’d imagined us being friends over and over,   
but that didn’t excuse this. This was clingy, creepy behavior.

I mean, dammit, I’d resorted to looking at old legends from a Native American tribe for information about their family. And while I totally respected the traditions of the   
tribes, to actually believe that the Cullens were vampires was just all sorts of crazy. I’d sooner believe that my dreams about the sparkly dude attacking me were actual   
prophetic visions of the future than accept this nonsense.

So instead of being a reasonable adult and just going to class and try maintaining healthy boundaries, I went back to the nurse and told her I thought I had a stomach bug.   
She called Aunt Mary, who gave me permission to walk myself home from school, and I booked it out. I really did have a nasty headache, and I was suffering from sleep deprivation, so that counted for something, right?

I didn’t have work that afternoon, and I’d finished most of my week’s homework over the weekend, so I just turned on some music and read. I had a few junky novels that I liked to turn to in times of trouble; nothing like poorly written romance to take your mind off of your own obsessive behavior.

Just when I was at the part where Roxy walked in on Sterling with Bianca and, heartbroken, decided to leave the Hamptons to try to make things work with her estranged husband, the doorbell rang. I debated not answering, but after a minute I sighed, marked my place, and trudged downstairs. It might be something important for Aunt Mary, after all. Plus, the rain was coming down pretty hard, and I didn’t want to make whoever it was wait.

I was expecting a delivery man with a package, or maybe a neighbor asking for a cup of sugar. Not Jasper Hale, his blond curls damp, holding what I'd guess to be my history homework.

“Hi there.” He shot me a disarming smile. When I didn’t say anything, his look became a bit more concerned. “You alright?”

“Uh… Yes.”

“Can I come in?” He asked patiently.

“Oh! Right, yeah, out of the rain, right,” I knew I was stuttering, but seriously, who wouldn’t if they suddenly found Jasper Hale on their front stoop? I stepped back to let   
him in.

“I brought your history homework, and a photocopy of my notes,” he said. “So you can catch up.”

“Oh! That’s… That was nice of you.” I took the stack of paper from him.

“Are you alright? Bella said you were in classes this morning.” He’d asked his sister about me? Or maybe she’d volunteered the info, but whatever, they had talked about   
me?

“Just wasn’t feeling too well,” I shrugged. “Do you want some water, or something?”

“No… I’m good, thanks.”

“Did you have a nice break?” I asked. “You went out of town, right?”

“N- Yeah. Yeah, we did,” Jasper said, almost quickly. “Visiting friends. What about you?”

“Oh, it was fine. My aunt had a bunch of coworkers over, so it got pretty hectic.”

“Yeah, I can imagine.”

We lapsed into silence, and I almost despaired. How could this boy I had such stilted, awkward conversations with be the same one I saw myself laughing with, being   
happy with, being in love with? The answer was obvious. The dreams were just… Dreams. I hardly had time to think it, though, before I could feel myself cheering up, although I couldn’t say why.

“I’m happy to help you catch up,” Jasper told me. At my confused look, he added, “In history. We did cover a fair amount of material today.”

“Oh, yeah, that would… That would be great.”

So that’s how I ended up sitting with Jasper Hale in my dining room, notebooks long forgotten, talking about, of all things, penguins.

“No, see it’s actually really cute,” I was saying, “Because the dude penguins search for the perfect rock, and then they give it to the lady of their choice, and if she accepts, she puts the pebble in her nest, and it’s like the penguin version of a wedding ring, and it’s seriously one of the most adorable-“

Jasper suddenly looked up towards the door. A moment later, I heard what he must have, Aunt Mary’s car coming up the driveway. “Oh, that’s just my aunt. God, is it four already?” So much for my relaxing afternoon. Then again, I wasn’t exactly going to complain.

“Should I say hello, or do you want me to sneak out the back?” He asked in mock-seriousness.

“Don’t worry, she hasn’t complained about the scads of boys I’ve been having over before,” I said in a similar tone.

He raised his eyebrows, and for a second he looked shocked, but then he grinned at me. “So I’m one of your many men?”

“That’s right,” I nodded.

“Any of those guys Tyler Crowley?” He asked in a faux-casual voice.

“What?” I was not expecting him to say that.

“He’s been saying you two were going to Winter Formal together.”

“Oh, no. I told him… Damn him!” I took a deep breath. “I am not going to Winter Formal with Tyler Crowley. I am not going to Winter Formal at all, but I am especially not   
going with Tyler Crowley.”

“Oh.” Jasper smiled, and I saw dimples. 

But Aunt Mary banged into the room at that moment, and I heard a soft ‘oh!’ as she caught sight of Jasper. “Mary Alice. You have a guest?”

“Yes, Aunt Mary,” I said, smiling at her.

Jasper held out his hand, “Jasper Hale, ma’am.”

I had expected the Southern twang I’d recently noticed in his voice to win her right over, but she gave him a cold look and didn’t take his hand. “Mary Alice, I’m having   
people over for dinner tonight, didn’t I tell you?”

“Uh… No?” I didn’t mean to sound pertinent, but she really hadn’t said anything.

“I think it’s time for me to go,” Jasper said softly.

“That might be for the best,” Aunt Mary said, but she gave him a small, confused smile as she left the room.

“I’ll walk you out?” I offered.

“Thanks.”

I was confused as he repacked his backpack and we headed towards the door, but I didn’t ask him about it. Instead, I smiled and waved as he headed towards his car. He   
turned just as he reached his door, and for a moment studied me with a face so kind, so open, that I felt the same adoration of my dreams blooming in my chest. Then he climbed into his car and drove away.


	8. Chapter 8

“God, Cynth, she just got really weird,” I sighed into my phone. “Like, he was super polite and she looked at him like he was a slug that had learned to talk.”

“Maybe she had a love affair with him,” Cynthia said. “And it was all illicit and stuff, and now she’s embarrassed, and afraid he’ll tell the police, cause that’s statutory.”

“You’re fourteen, what the hell do you know about illicit love affairs? Or statutory rape?”

“I’ve been watching a lot of Law and Order. You know, they always play the marathons on Thanksgiving.”

I laughed. God, I missed her so much. “I don’t think that’s what it is.” I checked my watch. “But it’s 8 o’clock, and none of her supposed guests have shown up yet.”

“Oh, did I tell you that I got invited to Carrie’s birthday party? It’s next week.”

“No, you didn’t! What sort of party? Am I gonna have to get the shotgun and start fighting off the boys?”

“Oh, please, I’m the one who’s going to have to get a shotgun! How are you going to deal with that Tyler guy?”

“I guess I’m just going to tell him I’m not going to formal and hope that this time, he gets it.”

“You’re too nice. And what about the Eric and Mike thing?”

“They’re nice boys. And they haven’t actually asked me out yet, and I’m not flirting, so I don’t see why I have to do anything at all.”

“But you wouldn’t say yes if they did,” Cynthia said in a sing-song voice.

No, I hadn’t told her about my dreams. She didn’t know about them, and I didn’t see any reason to enlighten her to the fact that her big sister was nuttier than fruitcake.  
But she’d heard me talk about Jasper enough to deduce that my feelings were a little more than platonic.

“How would you know? Maybe they’re hot Swedish models. And maybe I’m shallow.”

“Nah, if they were, you would have said something, but all you’ve been able to talk about is the pretty blond boy with the Southern accent and the dimples.”

“Shut up!”

I wished that I could reach over, give her a shove, and laugh with my arm around her. But no. Not yet, at least. Earlier, when she’d called, she’d told me that for an early Christmas present, Dad and Melissa had bought me a train ticket home. And I would, in fact, be missing the Winter Formal. So I hadn’t lied. I just hadn’t known that what I was saying was true while I was saying it. It was a technicality, but hopefully it would get Tyler off my back.

I was going home. For two weeks, I would be out of rainy Forks, and back in warm, sunny Mississippi. I’d be able to reach out and hug Cynthia whenever I wanted to. I’d be able to walk outside and not get drenched to the bone. The land would be flat. Maybe we’d even have a tornado. Oh, that would be nice.

“So that name… God, who names their kid Jasper?”

“Be nice! He’s a foster kid, maybe it was like, a remnant from his birth mother or something?”

“Oh, tragic, tortured past? God, you really know how to pick them.”

I laughed. “I hate you.”

“Alice?” I heard Aunt Mary call my name.

“I have to go, Cynthia, I’ll talk to you tomorrow, okay?”

“Okay. Love you!”

“Love you too!”

I hung up my phone and walked slowly downstairs. “Yes, Aunt Mary?”

“We need to talk.”

I was hoping for answers, so I sat down across from her at the kitchen table and arranged my face into what I hoped was a polite smile. “Alright.”

“You’re friends with Jasper Hale.” She didn’t ask it like a question, but I still felt the need to clarify.

“We have a class together.”

“I don’t like that boy.”

“Why?”

“Billy Black says that boy is bad news.”

I waited for more, but more was not forthcoming. “Is there anything else?”

“What do you mean?”

“I mean, just because Billy Black doesn’t like the Cullens doesn’t mean that there’s any reason why we shouldn’t.”

She looked confused at that. “Alice, I trust Billy.”

“And I trust Jasper. He’s nice. He came over to bring me my homework. And unless you’ve got anything else-“

“I think he’s hurt girls on the rez.”

“What?”

“Him or those brothers of his. The people on the rez… They’re scared of the Cullens. They don’t let them onto La Push, and they don’t go to the hospital, not since Dr.  
Cullen started working there.”

“Did Billy tell you this?”

Aunt Mary bit her lip. “No, but I can’t think of any other reason why they’re so uncomfortable with them.”

I could think of another reason, but before I could bring up the myth, I remembered Jacob’s reluctance to tell me that story. Maybe Aunt Mary hadn’t heard it.

“You can’t just accuse someone of something with no- No evidence, no reason to think it.”

“I’d rather make a false accusation then watch you get hurt.”

“Aunt Mary I’m… I am almost eighteen, I’m old enough to tell if someone’s got bad intentions or whatever.”

Aunt Mary didn’t say anything for a moment, she just gave me a look. “You’d be willing to risk that?” She finally asked me.

“I don’t think we can condemn someone because you have a bad feeling that’s not even based off of any accusations or anything… I’m not going to not be friends with him.”

“Then… Know that I tried. And know that if he ever did hurt you, I’d cut his balls off.”

I laughed. “Okay, I’ll keep that in mind.”

“Alright,” Aunt Mary said.

Yeah, she really wasn’t one for parenting. On the one hand, I was pretty sure you weren’t supposed to let your ward go out and hang around bad news boys… But on the other hand, I knew Jasper wasn’t actually bad news. I’d have seen it if he were. That much I knew.

Besides, it’s not like I had any room to be ungrateful. Without her, I’d still be in Mississippi, having Melissa glare at me every time I walked into a room. I’d be stuck, and I’d be miserable. Here I was… I was sort of happy.

That night, I dreamed about Jasper again. We were sitting somewhere warm, and there was music, and his arms were around me. He was talking about something softly, and I was tracing these pale lines that criss-crossed all over his hands and forearms.

And when I woke up the next morning, the rain hammering on the windows didn’t bother me at all.

—

Everyone was very kind when I got to school the next day. They wanted to know how I was feeling, make sure I wasn’t sick. I literally got mobbed as I walked up the path to school.

“We were just worried about you,” Jessica told me, when I brought it up while we walked to English. “I mean, you just vanished.”

“I had a stomach thing, I had to go home,” I shrugged. “It’s not that big of a deal.”

“But it is! You missed the interrogation we had planned for you.”

“Interrogation?” I laughed. “About what?”

“Um, hello? Your date for the Winter Formal?”

Oh, right. “I’m going to buy a car,” I told her, “For the sole purpose of mowing down Tyler Crowley.”

“What? Why?”

“He keeps telling everyone we’re going to Winter Formal together.”

“You’re not?” She looked disappointed.

“I’m not going to Winter Formal at all.” I sighed. “My ticket home is for that Wednesday, I’m not even going to be in Washington state that day.”

“Oh.” Jessica sighed. “Well, someone ought to tell Tyler.”

“Don’t worry, I will,” I rolled my eyes. “These guys, Jess, they think ‘no’ means ‘yes’ and ‘get lost’ means ‘take me, I’m yours’.”

“Did you just quote Hercules?”

“Maybe.”

When we got to English that morning, Bella waved at me.

—

Before I got to lunch, I was assuaged by Mike and Eric. Mike, at least, had the decency to wait until I sat down in Biology, but Eric had grabbed me before I even made it to my locker after English. Both conversations were remarkably similar. No questions about my break, how my nose was, or if I was feeling better since yesterday. Just a demanding voice, asking if I was really going to Winter Formal with Tyler Crowley. By this point, I was ready to get a sign, if only to avoid repeating this conversation.

But I still gamely answered Angela’s questions about it at lunch, not wanting to be rude to the one person who didn’t seem to be caught up in the gossip mill of the high school.

On that subject, when I asked why Lauren was sitting on the opposite end of the cafeteria, the others all exchanged glances, then Jess told me quietly that she’d had a thing for Tyler Crowley since freshman year, and was pretty upset when she heard he’d asked me to Winter Formal.

Fantastic.

So towards the end of lunch I schlepped over to where she was sitting and told her in a very calm and controlled voice that I had absolutely no interest in Tyler Crowley, was very sorry if she’d misconstrued anything, and hoped we could still be friends.

Bullshit. We were never friends. But I knew that when push came to shove, Jessica and quite possibly Angela would let the long years of friendship overrule any fondness they might have for me, so for the sake of tranquility I’d kiss Lauren’s ass. She still seemed upset, but at least slightly mollified that I was willing to come over and try to mend fences, after making me promise that I’d tell Tyler I wasn’t going to the dance with him the next time I saw him.

The whole thing felt silly and petty and stupid to me, but I knew that, had this been a year ago, and had some new student caught the attention of Kevin Briers, after I’d been crushing on him since Pre-K, I’d have been furious too. And, given that the transitive experiences I’d had in the past year were not common to girls my age, I knew I couldn’t get pissed over the fact that others didn’t see things my way. That while boys were nice and all, there were other things, deeper things, things that made the idea of sitting around and wondering if the person you liked was into someone else seem so… Wasteful. (And yes, I know I’ve been obsessing over Jasper Hale, I am still a teenage girl, that gives me the license to be a little bit hypocritical.)

I mean, of course I still did it, but I had a little more perspective than most girls my age, is all I’m saying.

And now time for gym class. Sigh. I hated having it right after lunch, I always felt sick running right after eating. Plus, now that I’d promised Lauren, I’d have to stick around and try to find Tyler before I went into the locker rooms.

So that’s how I found myself kicking the ground, waiting outside the gym eleven minutes before class started. I’d already poked my head inside, no one had showed up yet for either class, so I just had to wait him out. Assuming he was in at all.

Wouldn’t that be fantastic, if we kept leaving school sick or something and then missed each other? Until the day of winter formal? Then I’d be that bitch who left Tyler Crowley waiting, stood up a very popular boy who had deigned to ask the outsider to a dance. I didn’t need premonitions to see what would happen after that; Lauren would think I’d done it on purpose and edge me out of the group, I’d wander the school as an outcast. No one would befriend me, I’d be a pariah for the rest of my high school days. All alone, with no one beside m-

“Why do you look like someone just kicked your dog?” Jasper Hale had arrived. Perpetually early, that was another flaw of the Hale siblings.

“I’m… It’s annoying, I just…” I shook my head. When you’re into a boy, you don’t necessarily want him to know about other, over-persistent suitors.

“What is it?”

Then again, he looked so damn concerned for me.

“I’m trying find Tyler Crowley,” I admitted. At his raised eyebrows, I added, “Because he still thinks we’re going to Winter Formal together and that’s really screwing up a few things in my life right now.”

“Ah.” Jasper nodded. “You okay, though? You looked… More upset than I’d expect for that.”

“I’m not a confrontational person.”

“I see.” Jasper nodded. “Well, there’s your boy. Good luck.”

Tyler was walking down the hall. I sarcastically grinned at Jasper, who gave me a thumbs up, and peeled myself away from the hall to walk towards Tyler.

“Alice! Hey,” he grinned at me. “I’ve been meaning to talk to you.”

“Yeah, I’ve been looking for you too.” Oh, he looked very happy to hear that.

“How’ve you been?”

“Fine, yeah, look, Tyler, you’ve been telling people we’re going to the Formal together?”

“Well, yeah. That’s what you s- Do you mind stepping in here?” He literally put his hands on my shoulders and moved me into an alcove between two banks of lockers. Rude. “Hale was staring at us, it was kinda freaking me out.”

“Okay, look, Tyler…”

“So my friends and I already have reservations for that little Italian place- Do you like Italian? Everyone likes Italian- you know the one, by the bookstore in town, for six that night and my Mom likes to do pictures so would you mind coming over around 5:30 so we can do them? Oh, and let me know what color dress you’re wearing, so I can get a matching tie. And by the way, what’s your curfew? Cause I’ve got a few-“

“Tyler!” I cut him off. “I’m not going to the Formal with you!”

Tyler paused, then laughed. “What are you talking about?”

“Look, I told you when you asked, I didn’t know if I was going to be in town. And now I do know, I’m leaving the day before the dance. Nonrefundable ticket and all that. I’m sorry.”

Tyler blinked at me a couple times. “You know, I’m pretty sure you said yes.”

“I’m one hundred percent certain I didn’t.” I sighed and looked to the side.

“Hey, look, don’t get upset.” He paused for a moment. “There’s always prom.”

“Uh…” The warning bell rang, giving me the much needed excuse to duck back into the hallway and make my way to the gym. Jasper fell in step beside me.

“How’d it go?”

“Boys are resilient, he’ll get over himself.”

Jasper laughed. “Glad to know that you’re optimistic.”

“I’ll see you later,” I said, peeling off towards my class.

“See you.”


	9. Chapter 9

The week was mostly uneventful. After I’d calmed the rumors about me and Tyler, things went back to normal. Mostly. Jasper and I kept having brief conversations between classes, or in the five minutes before history. It seemed like we both kept showing up earlier and earlier, until I was practically sprinting down the hallways to get there. Of course, he always was there first. Damn him. And his long legs.

But this was… Good. We talked. We joked. We laughed. We were becoming friends. And I was very happy about that.

Other people, not so much.

Everyone wanted to know what the heck I had to say that was so interesting that Jasper Hale, who never gave anyone the time of day, wanted to hear. I couldn’t really say anything to that (after all, it wasn’t as if I acted any differently with him. I was very good at hiding my giddiness, I’d say there was at least a 60% chance he didn’t know I had a crush on him) because there really was no way for me to explain why all of a sudden he was showing up as I walked from class to class, holding doors for me, offering me help with my books.

I still hypothesized, though. But only to Cynthia, when I knew it would never get back to him.

“I think it might be a southern thing? He told me that his family moved around a lot before his parents died and they lived all over. He was happy to come to the north, but he said they lived in Texas for a while, so maybe he’s just feeling nostalgic.”

“Alice, a boy does not spend an entire history class whispering with you about bubble wrap out of nostalgia.”

I thought about that for a moment. I liked Jasper. It seemed like he was interested. But he was a lot harder to get a read on than the other guys… And to be honest, it was a lot easier to tell when someone liked you when you weren’t interested in them.

Plus, we’d only been talking for like two weeks. That wasn't soon enough to know. Right?

“I don't know, I can't even think about it. I’m screwing up in math, I need to get that under control before midterms. Plus I’ve just got a ton of stuff due before break. Boys can wait until after New Years.”

“But… You need to have stories when you come for break! I want to hear it all. At least tell me you’ll bring me a picture.”

“I’ll see if I can filch a yearbook from last year,” I joked.

“What, you can’t be all flirty and get him to take selfies with you?”

“That’s not how we are, it’s not… Not like that.”

“That what is it like?”

That was a very good question. One I wasn’t sure I had an answer for. We talked and teased and laughed and when I was with him, it felt like I could breath for the first time in months. I didn’t even know how smothered I felt the rest of the time until it was suddenly gone, and I felt relief. I was becoming startlingly, dangerously, attached to this boy.

And I didn’t care. Even if the rest of the world did. 

“It’s like… Oh, Cynth, if I tell you, you’re going to think I sound crazy.”

“Mary Alice Brandon, I already know for a fact that you’re crazy.” We paused, then both burst out into laughter. “You can tell me,” she said, as the giggles subsided. “I’m your sister.”

“It’s like… Like when you’re standing on the edge of the water at the beach, and there are just those little waves coming up to your feet, just barely hitting you, but you can see the bigger one building, the freaking tsunami wave. And you know that you can either run, back up to the sand where you’ll be dry and safe or… Or you can just let it come for you, and see what happens next.”

Cynthia was silent for a moment. “Well, Ali, I’m glad you’re getting in touch with your poetic side, but at the same time, I want you to know that if you’re at the edge of the water when a tsunami hits, you drown. The water comes and you drown. That’s what happens.”

“Thanks Cynthia.”

So that was it. I was going to drown in this boy.

Oh, well.

—

“You smell like cookies.”

I looked up at Mike Newton as he settled beside me at the picnic table in front of the school. “I work at a bakery.”

“Yeah, you do,” He nodded. “But I still think you would have had a promising career in hardware.” We both laughed at that. “Hey,” he asked, “You okay?”

“I am,” I nodded. I tipped my head up, wind blowing my hair back. “You?”

Mike nodded and pointed upwards. “It’s snowing.”

I smiled up at the sky. “I haven’t seen snow since I was like, six. My parents took us skiing in the mountains.”

Mike reached out and pushed some of my hair back behind my ear, and the smile dropped from my face. I looked out across the parking lot. That shiny Volvo the Cullens and the Hales always came in had just pulled into the lot. I snorted internally, when I remembered Thanksgiving, and how I’d actually allowed myself to believe for a moment that they were vampires. Okay, maybe I had psychic dreams that could not yet be explained, but come on. A girl has to draw the line somewhere. I knew my face was stony but that didn’t stop him from leaning in. I jerked back, scooting further across the bench from him. “Mike.” My voice held a warning.

“Alice, I’m sorry, I want to be straight with you.”

I’d seen this coming. Last night, I’d seen this exact situation. But I wasn’t planning on running from this. I would be glad to have this over with.

“Okay, Mike.”

“I like you. And if… If you’d like, maybe we could go to Port Angeles this Friday? See a movie?”

“Mike, I can’t do that.”

Mike chewed on his lower lip. “I just… Can I ask why? I mean, is there someone else?” His voice was forcibly light. He glanced over to where the Hales where disembarking.

“Dammit, Mike, it would hurt Jessica’s feelings.”

Mike squinted at me. “What?”

“You know she likes you, right?”

“What?”

“Oh, my God, I am not betraying the secrets of the ovarian sisterhood here, I’m telling you something a blind man could see. She’s into you.” I looked back up at the snowy sky. “Look, Jess lights up like a damn Christmas tree every time you walk into the room, she’s always leaning on you and laughing at your jokes. Mike, she likes you. And I… Don’t. So if you’re looking for a girlfriend… I’m not saying you have to ask her out, cause if you’re just asking because she likes you, that’s mean and it’ll end up hurting her. But if you really do like her, or think it’s possible you could, then just take a minute and- and think about it. Okay?”

He stared at me, open-mouthed for a few moments. “Alice-“

“Mike, I really, really hope you and I will still be friends because I do like you. Just not like that. I think you’re funny, and nice, and I really hope you weren’t just friends with me because I was the… The shiny new girl.”

“What? No, Alice, of course not. Of course we’re still friends.” He reached out and took my hands. “God, you’re like one of the coolest people I know, of course we’re friends.” He smiled at me. “I mean, I guess I just… I guess I have a lot to think about, huh?” He smiled at me. “But Alice, of course we’re still friends.”

“Thank you.” We both sat back. 

He had a kicked puppy look on his face. Whatever. Not my problem.

I did feel a little bad. There were the usual questions running through my mind. Had I been leading him on? Should I have said anything sooner? What if this destroyed my friendships?

But I hadn’t been leading him on, I’d been nice. But not flirty. If I’d said something sooner, it would have sounded presumptuous and bitchy. And I didn’t think this would destroy my friendship. Not with Mike, he seemed to floored by the news about Jessica to be too concerned with the rest of it. And not with the others, Jessica couldn’t be mad at me for not reciprocating Mike’s feelings. But if it did… I’d cope. I’d have to.

“So… The ovarian sisterhood?” Mike asked.

I laughed and hit his arm. “Hey, shut up!”

—

Not two days later, Jessica texted me that Mike had asked her to the Winter Formal.

Damn, I’m good.

—

“I don’t know… The shoes make me too tall.”

“If only we all had those problems.”

Jessica snorted, and Angela grinned, kicking the offending footwear off. We had spent the better part of the afternoon in Port Angeles, trying to get the girls set for Winter Formal. It was Tuesday. My train was leaving early Wednesday morning, and formal was Friday night, which was when winter break officially started. The girls were heading back to Port Angeles Friday afternoon to get mani-pedis and make overs before the dance, but I’d reassured them in no uncertain terms that I was not jealous, as by that time on Friday I’d be at least three hours deep into a Disney movie marathon with Cynthia, getting fat on gingerbread and getting drunk on eggnog and spiced rum.

It was a Christmas tradition.

So I was with them to give my opinions. Lauren hadn’t come along, have snagged both a pastel pink dress and a date with a boy from her English class a week ago. Angela was going with Eric ‘as friends’, but although I’d never accuse sweet Angela of having ulterior motives, both she and Eric had been sending not-so-discreet looks at Ben Cheney, and seemed to be reveling in the waves of jealousy rolling off of him that were almost palpable.

I hadn’t had to have the ‘talk’ with Eric yet, namely because he’d gotten so invested in his little scheme with Angela that he’d backed off from me, although only time would tell if the change in his attitude was permanent or not.

Angela had nearly everything she needed, and was only deliberating over shoes, while Jess would not settle on anything. It would be infuriating, if I didn’t know that I was just like that when I was nervous.

It was sweet. Jessica was nervous, and Mike was too scared of screwing things up with her to even look at me. A welcome relief.

I ended up trolling the racks myself, until I found what I knew would be the perfect dress for Jessica. “Red is a good color on you,” I told her, “Get an updo and wear thin jewelry.” I shoved the clothes into her arms, and went back to sorting through the shoes for Angela. Nothing too tall, nothing too thin (she’d warned me about her balance when I’d begun this endeavor), and nothing too sparkly.

“I can’t believe you’re missing your first real dance since coming here. You weren’t here during Homecoming, you’re missing Winter Formal…”

“Yeah, can you promise us attendance at the Sadie Hawkins Dance? It’s in March. And then, Prom’s in May…” Jessica spoke to us from the dressing room in the corner of the little shop.

“Good lord, how many dances do you guys have?”

“Just the four. Plus Spring Fling, but that’s, like, a fair, not a dance.”

I shook my head. “Back home we would get Homecoming and Prom, if we were lucky.”

“They’d cancel your prom?”

“They did when I was a freshman, so I didn’t really care because prom was upperclassmen only, but the seniors took their senior prank too far… The principal’s secretary had to get three stitches and a tetanus shot. Not to mention I’m pretty sure they had to put the possum down…”

“Oh, my God.”

“Yeah. So they cancelled prom for that.”

“I can see why.” Angela and I chuckled as Jessica stepped out.

“This is the dress.”

I grinned. “That’s the dress!”

It was almost dinner time, when a dress caught my eye. Jessica and Angela had already paid, so I waved them out, and told them that they should get a table, that I’d meet them at the restaurant. It was just a street over, after all.

The dress was nothing too spectacular, it was beige with a white lace overlay, but it looked cute and I took a minute to try it on.

Not really my style, whatever. I shucked it and pulled my jeans and sweater back on, thanked the shopkeep who looked, quite frankly, relieved to have me leave so she  
could lock up. It was already eight. Whoops.

I was still yanking my arm into my jacket when a guy smoking outside the bar across the street hollered out, “Hey, sweetheart, what that mouth do?”  
I really wish I could say that my response was “It says fuck off!” or that I flipped him double middle fingers and stormed off, but that’s not the world we live in. Instead, I shoved my hands in my pockets and walked down the snowy sidewalk, my head down. It would be quicker to cut through the alley, to get to the restaurant, but when I glanced back I saw the smoker still looking at me, so I decided to go up and take an actual cross-street over. It happened when I hit the corner.

There was a terrible screeching noise, that of metal ripping apart, mixed with the sound of glass shattering and tires skidding. My brain took a moment to comprehend what was in front of me; the massive truck wrapped around the tiny parked car looked almost comical, as if it couldn’t possibly have actually happened, as if it were staged, like for a movie.

My phone was in my hand before I knew what I was doing, dialing 911. I spat the cross street out to the operator and then, “There’s been an accident… A semi hit a car… I don’t know, it looks like they’re hurt. Please, send an ambulance.” I could already hear the sirens in the distance. “Please hurry.”

The next few minutes were a blur. By the time the ambulances managed to pry the cars apart, the truck driver was already dead. He’d headfirst through the windshield. I couldn’t look away, even when the police woman pulled me to the side to question me.

“I- I don’t know. The car was parked and it looked like the truck tried to brake too fast and just… It just spun into it.”

It took me a while to register that it was Jess’s car. I’d had a moment of panic, until I remembered that this was where we’d parked in the first place, that of course the others weren’t in it, I’d have seen them.

Of course I would have.

I wasn’t sure how long it took me to recognize that the shrill screeching in my head wasn’t just my brain trying to implode from all the sheer absurdity of what I’d just witnessed, but was originating from the ringing phone in my hand.

“Hello?” The word was dull and thick on my tongue.

“Alice? Where the fuck are you? It’s been nearly an hour, are you okay?” Jessica’s voice was tinged with equal parts concern and annoyance.

“Um.” That was as far as I could get. Should I be the one to tell her what happened to her car? Should I be the one to tell her that a man had just died? After a hard swallow, I told her, “There was a car accident. I saw it on my way to the restaurant and the cop wants me to wait.”

“Oh, that sucks. Uh… Hope you don’t mind, but we kind of ordered already. So… We’ll text you when we’re done?”

“Sounds good.”

I don’t know why I’d lied. The cop had taken my statement and moved on to the other dozen or so witnesses who’d seen the accident, telling me to keep my phone near because they might be in touch, but otherwise I was free to go; but I just couldn’t seem to look away.

A glance at my phone told me that before I’d picked up, I’d missed six calls from Angela, and two from Jessica.

“Alice?”

I didn’t know how long Bella Hale had been standing there, but she startled me nonetheless. “Hi,” I said weakly.

“Hey. Are you… Okay?” 

I shrugged sloppily, and began babbling, “Uh… Well, I sort of saw the crash, and, you know, it threw me for a loop, you know, I’m not quite… I’m just not… It just startled me, you know?” I knew I was speaking quickly, and my voice was thick with tears, but I couldn’t make myself take a steadying breath.

“It’s okay,” she told me, quickly. “You’re okay.”

I shook my head. “No, I mean, not really, because the guy who it was, the guy who hit the car, he, uh, he kind of, I mean, he’s dead. So that’s really not okay. I’m sorry, I know I’m not making sense, but I just, uh, I mean, the guy just died and I don’t-“

“What’s happened?”

Suddenly, things seemed to snap back into perspective. The tears that were gathering in the corner of my eyes seemed to dry, the tightness in my chest eased, and my shoulders relaxed. I didn’t feel any less miserable about the dead guy, but it felt like I was on steadier ground.

Jasper appeared beside me, and I was able to breath again.

“She saw the accident.” Bella cast an apprehensive glance at the scene, but Jasper quickly shook his head, and put a hand on my shoulder.

“Are you here alone?”

I jerked my head side to side. “No, no, Jess and Angela just went ahead to, uh, to the restaurant, and I was supposed to meet them, but I saw the accident and I just didn’t…”

“Alright,” Jasper said, “We’ll take you to meet them.”

I nodded quickly, jerkily, and with his hand on the small of my back, Jasper guided me down the sidewalk, away from the accident.

I wasn’t sure how he knew which restaurant; maybe I’d mentioned it in my incoherent babbling, but soon we were standing outside of it, just as Jess and Angela stepped out.

“Are you okay?”

I guess there was something on my face that told Jessica and Angela that something was wrong, because they both immediately reached for me, identical looks of consternation on their faces.

“Um…” I pointed behind me towards the wreck. “Jessica… Your car kind of… Got flattened.”

It took about twenty minutes for an appropriate course of action to be decided upon. Jessica had sprinted down the street in time for the cop to calm her, tell her they’d give her an accident report, and the truck company’s insurance would be covering the cost of a new car.

“I can drive you home,” Bella offered, as the tow truck hauled the remains of the cars away.

“I’d only had it for a year…” Jess groaned, clearly not paying attention.

“That would be good, thank you,” Angela responded for the two of them.

It was around then that I’d found a bench and sat down, my head in my hands. Jasper and Angela were both on me in a second, asking what was wrong.

“Sorry,” I whispered. “Head rush.” I tried to smile up at them. “Low blood sugar, you know.”

“Oh, you haven’t eaten, I’m sorry, that was so inconsiderate,” Angela began to babble. Funny how just about the only thing that could get her out of her shell was when she thought she’d been an inconvenience to others.

“Jasper,” Bella began slowly, “why don’t you take her to get something to eat, and I’ll drive the others home?”

“But then you’ll be stuck here,” Jess pointed out.

“No, Bella and I drove over separately,” Jasper and Bella were exchanging odd looks. Finally, she nodded, and Jasper continued, “If it’s all right with you guys…?”

Jess and Angela both waited until after I’d nodded before they chimed in with “Sure”’s and “Okay”’s, which was a nice gesture, I suppose. Jess smirked at me over her shoulder as the two of them followed Bella down the street, already apparently over the trauma of seeing her crushed car.

“Are you sure you’re alright?” Jasper asked again, helping me up from the bench. His hands were cold even through both of our gloves.

I nodded, still a little shell-shocked, and he led me down the street towards a small diner tucked in between a bookstore and a dry cleaner.

We were seated quickly; the hostesses, having seen my tearstained face were alternating between giving me sympathetic looks and glaring at the back of Jasper’s head. Assuming some sort of sisterhood camaraderie, they’d clearly already taken my side in the nonexistent fight between us.

“The waitresses are gonna spit in your food,” I warned him. “They think you’re being mean to me.”

“Duly noted,” he said dryly. “I noticed them glaring daggers.”

“You walk in with a crying girl, the assumption is you’re up to no good.”

“Well, that’s ultimately up to you to decide,” he grinned.

“Hm,” I pretended to consider. “Well, you and your sister did manage some artful maneuvering to get me away from my friends.”

“Ah, yes. We staged a car crash, giving you a panic attack and destroying Jessica’s car so I could talk to you,” Jasper nodded along. “Because it’s not as if I see you every day in History anyways.”

“I don’t know… I am leaving tomorrow. Seems like a pretty normal reaction to the thought of being deprived of my wonderful presence for two weeks.”

“Oh no… You’re onto me.” He reached across the table and grabbed my wrist. “Of course, now that you’ve figured out my master plan, I’m going to have no choice but to silence you. Before you tip off your hostess friends.”

I couldn’t help but laugh at the faux-serious look on his face, drawing the attention of the waitstaff. After a few whispered conversations between them, one waitress finally came over to take our order.

After she left, Jasper frowned at me. “You just had a dizzy spell from low blood sugar, shouldn’t you get something more substantial than salad?”

“God, man, didn’t anyone ever tell you not to criticize a girl’s eating habits?” At the look of abject horror that spread across his face, I laughed. “I’m totally screwing with you. Besides, if you didn’t notice I got a milkshake too. That’s where it’s at.”

“Ah, I see.” I noticed with a jolt that he still hadn’t let go of me; instead, he began absentmindedly tracing circles on the soft skin on the underside of my wrist with his index finger.

Suddenly I felt a pang of nerves mixed with annoyance, of course he’d finally make a move when I was going to be gone for the next fortnight. He immediately let go of my wrist.

Okay. Maybe he wasn’t making a move.

If Brandon girls are good at one thing, it’s steering through awkward moments. So I started shooting off about how Ms. Jordan was such a fascist to give us a 20 page research paper over break, and Jasper reminded me about how we’d known about it since October. The moment might have been lost, but the dinner was saved.  
Between bites of salad I tried to convince him that Lincoln was a better president than FDR, and he would laugh and counter every point. It wasn’t until I noticed the waitresses wiping down the tables around us and giving us stink-eye that I pointed out that we should probably go.

“Feeling better?” Jasper asked as he held the door open for me. I nodded, glancing at him through half-lidded eyes, and failing to take into account the slick sidewalks. It only took about two seconds for my feet to skid out from under me. “Careful,” Jasper said, catching me. “I know you don’t have far to fall, but you should still try to avoid it.”

I pouted. “I am not that short,” I said, from my position in his arms. “You’re freakishly tall.”

“Alice. Do you even break five feet?”

“…No.”

“My point.”

He kept his arm around my waist as he guided me down the street, towards a car I vaguely recognized as the Hales having ridden in to school once or twice.

I got quiet as I got in, buckling my seatbelt while Jasper started the car. I was tired, and still needed to pack for break, unable to have willed myself to do it any sooner, a procrastinator until the end. By the time I was home and done, it would nearly be time to leave for my train. I wasn’t sleeping tonight. Jasper seemed to sense my desire for silence, and kept his eyes on the road most of the way back to Forks.

“Alice?” My name sounded soft in his voice.

“Hm?”

“I think you should stay in Mississippi.”


	10. Chapter 10

The days in Mississippi were dragging on. All plans for a fun-filled two weeks hanging with my little sister were being derailed, as I could barely summon the energy to get out of bed, never mind leave the house. My father and Melissa had neither noticed nor cared, too wrapped up in themselves to do much more than pass me an envelope with a hundred bucks in it as a Christmas present, and mumble a half-hearted thanks to the scarf and gloves I’d gotten them, respectively.

Today I’d made it to the basement, a first for this week, watching old movies and shoveling popcorn down my throat at a frankly alarming rate, while Cynthia looked on, concerned.

“You’re going to tell me eventually, right?”

“Hm?” I paused to swallow the mouthful of popcorn I was chomping on. “What are you talking about?”

“You’re depressed about something. I won’t push, so long as you promise you’ll tell me eventually, right?”

“I…” I shook my head. “I think the cookies are done, I’m going to get them out of the oven.”

It was true, I was depressed. Over a boy. Which was pathetic. Which I knew. Which only made me more depressed.

I got dumped. Without having dated the guy first. How sad was that? And what was worse, I couldn’t stop replaying that night in my head.

“I think you should stay in Mississippi.”

“What?” I was sure I’d misheard I had not been expecting that. 

The hurt that slammed into me when he said that must have bled into my voice, because he hastily continued, “Alice, I’m not trying to hurt your feelings. But things are   
dangerous here. You’d be better off.”

“What are you talking about? This is Forks. There’s nothing dangerous here.”

“Things aren’t always as they seem.” His voice went flat, emotionless. “My family and I… We’re different. And I need you to trust me when I say that it doesn’t matter how, but it’s not something you should be around. If you stay in Forks, things could get very bad.”

“Are you threatening me?” I didn’t ask accusatorially, but I was floored, trying to get my head around how things could have gotten so warped, when just a few minutes ago we were laughing over my milkshake.

“No,” Jasper was speaking slowly and deliberately, as if each word was carefully chosen. “Alice, never. But there are larger forces at work here, things you couldn’t even imagine, and I need you to trust me when I say that you are better off in Mississippi.”

“You want me to leave.” It was a statement, not a question, but I could see him working his jaw after I said it, like it caused him pain.

“If I were a better man, I would.”

“Okay, what the hell does that mean?” I crossed my arms, leaning against the passenger door, putting as much distance between the two of us as possible.

“It’s a catch twenty two,” Jasper laughed, bitterly, a much changed man from the one I’d just had dinner with. “If I told you, if you knew the truth, you’d be running away as quickly as possible, there’d be no need for me to warn you away, but if you knew… You’d be that much more entangled, that much more at risk if anyone else knew, so I am begging, Alice, for your own sake, stay in Mississippi.”

“I don’t understand,” I shook my head. “Th-this doesn’t make sense.” And the world, the future I’d built on the dreams I’d had was falling around me, but before my feelings could expand out of hurt and rejection to downright despair, I felt them catch, as a wave of calm overtook me, and I tried to use it to think logically, although the situation itself defied logic.

“I’m sorry. I am so sorry; if there were a way I could explain, if I could tell you everything, believe me, I would. But all I can say is that you being here, and us being friends, only will serve to hurt you in the long run.”

There were two warring urges within me; pride, that wanted to scream that we weren’t friends, of course we’d never been friends, that he meant nothing to me so of course this didn’t hurt at all. Curiosity was telling me to pry and pull at his story, break it apart and learn what had turned someone I’d come to consider one of my best friends here against me.

Ultimately, neither won out as he pulled up to Aunt Mary’s house. Feeling numb, I unbuckled my seatbelt, and opened the door. Before I could get out of the car, Jasper’s hand wrapped around my wrist, and I turned, hoping for a punchline or something, anything, that would explain the miserable conversation we’d just had. “Goodbye, Mary Alice.”

So there I was, left trying to piece together exactly what he meant. 

He’d spoken of danger, of something he couldn’t tell me, and then he’d said goodbye. As if this was the end of it, as if he didn’t owe me a better explanation for why he’d decided to shut me out all of a sudden, as if I didn’t deserve at least something more detailed than ‘for your own sake, stay in Mississippi’.

And I couldn’t even find it in me to be mad; instead I only felt sad. I’d pictured things between us going so differently, seen and known that they could. I didn’t have the consolation of more visions to tell me that things would end up alright either. I was half-considering staying in Mississippi, mostly out of the fear of the humiliation I’d face walking into school in January and seeing Jasper. And given that I’d taken the time to actually look at re-enrolling here in Biloxi, my future was too muddled for my dreams to show me more than just flashes of what might be, nothing concrete enough for me to actually grasp. The more frustrating side of my gift was showing itself; until I made up my mind, I couldn’t see anything, but I couldn’t make up my mind about such a big decision after spending so many years just depending on my visions for guidance.

I supposed I’d have to handle things the frustratingly normal way, and talk about them.

I plated up the gingerbread cookies Melissa had made, and dodged the woman herself with practiced skill as I made my way back down to Cynthia.

“Okay, so here’s the thing…”

The story Cynthia got was a little more condensed. I left out most of the stuff about danger, and just told her that he’d said that things could be bad for me if I stayed, and that I had no idea what he’d meant. And that I was sad because of it, and I didn’t know what to do.

“Well, he’s an ass.”

I probably ought to have expected this response, having known Cynthia her whole life, but as always, the big sister in me was shocked whenever I turned to see that Cynthia was not a seven year old asking me when the tooth fairy would come.

“He is not.” My knee jerk reaction was to defend Jasper, and I stood by it. I knew that there had to be something more to the story, some reason he acted the way that he did.

“Alice, he totally is. Who the hell does he think he is, telling you what to do? He doesn’t even know you, not really. He can’t tell you that you need to move. Who gave him the right? He’s an ass.”

“I don’t—“

“Alice, don’t tell me you are seriously considering listening to that guy? Where does he get off, bossing you around like that?”

“I mean… What if they’re in the mob?”

“What?”

“What if the Hales are in the mob, and he’s trying to keep me safe?”

“Oh my God, Alice, he’s just being an asshole, you can’t actually think him telling you to get out of town is some sort of sweet, protective gesture.”

I shrugged, and looked to the side. “I don’t know. If you’d asked me five minutes prior to the conversation, I wouldn’t peg him as that much of an asshole.”

“Look, here’s what you’re going to do. You’re going to go back to Forks, and if he says boo to you about it, you’re going to tell him to screw himself, and that you’re a grown-ass woman who can make her own choices, and he needs to back the hell off. But first, you’re going to stop laying in bed all day, and actually spend some of your holiday with me as a real, live, functioning human being, okay?”

I smiled at Cynthia. “Can I still eat all the cookies Melissa keeps baking?”

“Girl, yes you can, calories don’t count on holiday, everyone knows that.”

So it was decided. More by my bossy baby sister than me, but it was decided. I was going back to Forks. It was for the best, really. Life with my Dad and Melissa was difficult and uncomfortable even during such a short period of time, I’d never make it through the year and a half until graduation.

And with the decision finally made, the waters clear, I was able to dream.

I stood in the middle of a forest, just after a storm. The air was heavy and damp, and I could feel the cold from the ground seeping in through the soles of my shoes.  
Jasper stood a few feet away from me, watching me with amber eyes. Waiting for me to speak.

“Kind of murdery that you brought me to the middle of the woods to talk to me.”

Jasper laughed. “Sorry. Just didn’t want anyone to overhear this.”

“Well, I think you’ve accomplished that. No one around to hear me scream.”

“You’re not really afraid.”

“No,” a smile began to creep its’ way across my mouth. “I’m not.”

“So you heard the legends. What possible reason could you have for believing them?” He didn’t sound angry, just curious.

“Well, if not for the fact that you and your family all act shady as hell, I probably wouldn’t have tried to pry.”

“Alice.” His face became stern. “If I tell you this… I was serious before. You knowing puts you in more danger than before. Not from me or my family, but if someone else finds out that I told you, they might try to kill you.”

“I mean, there are lots of reasons someone might try to kill me. I’m a very annoying woman.”

“Don’t joke.” Before I could blink, he was in front of me, cradling my face in his cold hands. “If something happened to you, I couldn’t live with myself.”

“I know.” I leaned forward, pressing my forehead to his shoulder. “But I already know.”

The scene dissolved, and suddenly we were hurtling through the woods, me cradled in his arms, my own arms around his neck. I was half-screaming, half-laughing, the wind causing me to tear up as Jasper ran.

The world faded once more, and reformed to Emmett and Bella wrestling in a way that no humans should be able to, Bella throwing Emmett over her shoulder and into the tree line, Jasper, Edward and Esme cheering in the background.

The images began blurring, coming faster and faster.

Rosalie on one side of the room, then the other, a half second passing.

Carlisle and Esme, fingers entwined, dancing together in the kitchen of their house, moving with ethereal grace.

Emmett lifting a car overhead while Rosalie stood under and worked on the engine.

Bella and Edward racing across the yard of their house, darting through the trees and leaping over a river that snaked its way around the edge of the property, clearing it in a single bound.

Jasper and Emmett, rough housing. Jasper pushing too hard, and a tree coming down as Emmett hit it.

Jasper hunting a deer, stalking it before pouncing, like a giant cat, bringing his mouth to its neck. He pulled away, his mouth dripping red.

Jasper, Jasper, Jasper.

I sat straight up in my bed. My eyes adjusted to the dark of my childhood bedroom. The world still seemed to be in place. There were still glow-in-the-dark stars on the ceiling, still an overflowing bookshelf in the corner, still Cynthia’s sleeping form in a bed across the room.

But my world had shifted off of its’ axis.

Jacob’s story from Thanksgiving came flooding back to me. Cold ones. Blood drinkers.

Vampires.

And I was sure. These dreams, with this much clarity, they only came when I was sure. Excluding the part between myself and Jasper, I’d probably just seen their activities for the next day, played out in my mind. Just a day in the life of a vampire family.

The Cullens and Hales were vampires.

I knew that if I was a rational human being who knew beyond a shadow of a doubt that there were vampires in her town, I’d probably be terrified. I’d probably be in my father’s room right now, begging him to let me move back to Biloxi.

I wasn’t.

Instead, I leaned against my headboard as the last few months snapped into a new perspective. It made sense why they were so reclusive. Why Jasper and Emmett had been   
rude to me in the beginning. Why Rosalie had looked at me as if I’d killed her cat when I got my bloody nose in gym class, and why Edward had burst into the nurse’s office a few minutes later.

Why Jasper had told me to stay out of Forks, and told me that he couldn’t say why.

Contemplatively, I swung down out of bed, walked downstairs, and poured myself a glass of water. Was I crazy? Had something inside me finally snapped? Was that what this was? It would be pretty easy to get myself committed, saying that I could see the future and I had a crush on a vampire.

I’d long since put to bed the fears that I was losing my mind over my visions, but sometimes they crept back up. Then again, they say that those who worry about being crazy aren’t crazy. So as long as I kept up some reasonable skepticism, I might be alright.

But then, of course, the fact that I was acknowledging that I felt fairly certain that a family at my school was comprised of vampires probably indicated that that skepticism was long gone.

And now I was just confusing myself.

I sipped my water, taking a seat at the kitchen table. It was only four in the morning. I should probably go try and get a few more hours of sleep, but after the revelations of my dream, I wasn’t sure if I’d be able to.

It was almost a new year. Christmas had come and gone, without much fanfare. Ever since… Well, ever since last year, we Brandons hadn’t been much for celebration. Melissa hadn’t even bothered with a tree. I knew that it killed Cynthia, that she was ready to be done mourning and live life again, but that she’d never dare say it to our father, or Melissa. Or to me.

No, staying in Mississippi hadn’t ever really been an option. In this house, with its history and with Melissa looking at me the way she did, I knew I would never be happy here. She hadn’t spoken two words to me since I’d come back. I didn’t blame her. I hated myself for how things had happened, before. I didn’t think I’d ever forgive myself.  
My father was likewise distant. He’d hugged me when I first got in, all elbows and angles as he welcomed his eldest child home. Since then, we’d had a few conversations, mostly about the weather and my grades. But nothing substantial.

Cynthia had once explained to me that she believed that there were strings of a sort, keeping souls tethered together, tying people to those most important, that couldn’t be damaged by distance or age. She said the two of us had a rope between us, thick and strong and unbreakable. If that was true, the strings between my father and I had snapped years ago, and I didn’t believe that they could be repaired or retied, even if we’d wanted to try. We couldn’t undo the damage of a decade of neglect and emotional abuse.

I hated him, in a way. For not understanding, for pushing me away when I was too little to understand why, and for never reaching out to repair our relationship, instead focusing on his replacement wife and his second daughter who didn’t ask every night when Mommy was coming home. It wasn’t Cynthia’s fault, and, unpleasant though she may be, it wasn’t Melissa’s either. I had been a child, but my father, the adult, still couldn’t find it in him to try and make things right between us.

I put my glass in the sink and walked up to bed.

Four days later, I was back in Aunt Mary’s car, driving back to Forks from Port Angeles, the situation strongly reminiscent of my first day in Washington. But this time I knew what I was getting into.

“The house was quiet, with you gone,” Aunt Mary observed.

I clicked my tongue but didn’t respond, leaning my forehead against the window of the car.

I’d spent a lot of time, thinking about what I’d say when I saw Jasper again. How to get us to the conversation where he chose to open up and share it all with me. I was debating between just walking around like everything is normal, or going up to his lunch table, slamming my hands down to get his attention, and just asking, ‘So, vampires, huh?’

Neither one seemed particularly promising.

I spent my night unpacking my suitcase and repacking my backpack for school the next morning. I’d finished my homework over the first few days of break. Turns out that not wanting to talk to anyone or do anything that involved being social actually did wonders for my productivity when it came to school work. Who knew?

I didn’t sleep well. Too nervous about the upcoming day, I tossed and turned the whole night. That morning, I was so tired that I lost track of time in the shower, had to do a rush job with my hair and ended up just throwing it under a beanie, didn’t get more than eyeliner on until I saw that I was already late, and was down the street before I realized I’d walked out of the house wearing shoes from two different pairs. Giving the morning up for a wash, I trudged back to the house, and kicked off the red pump on my left foot to switch it out for a matching black boot.

Aunt Mary came into the hallway and gave me a half-smirk, half-grimace. She seemed to be on her way out, keys in hand. I hated to do it, but given the morning I’d had and the day I’d likely continue to have, I had no choice. “Aunt Mary, could you write me a tardy slip?”

I expected a fight. It had been a condition when I moved in that I’d be self-sufficient, and at most she’d write a sick note if I had appendicitis or diphtheria or something. And when Aunt Mary raised her eyebrow at me, I was ready for a ‘get your ass to school and stop being lazy’, but instead, she just said, “Pass me a pen.”

I dug one out of my backpack, and handed it over.

“Don’t make a habit of it,” Aunt Mary said, giving me the note. “But if you’re going to be late, take the time to fix your hair.”

“Thank you.” I tucked the note into my pocket.

Aunt Mary left, giving me ample time to rewash my hair and properly style it, fix my make up, and find a more flattering dress to wear, this time with matching shoes. I was ready to go.

I checked the clock on my way to the door. If I left now, then I’d be getting in just in time to see Edward and Bella in Bio. But I couldn’t do that, couldn’t face them, not yet. And I’d already missed English and French, so what’s one more class, in the grand scheme of things? That was a reasonable enough rationalization to pause and eat something more substantial than an apple for breakfast, I decided, texting Mike to ask for a copy of his Biology notes, and pouring myself a bowl of Fruit Loops while I ran down the clock.

Call me crazy, but I needed to see Jasper first.

So I walked slowly to school, chatted with the receptionist in the front office, dallied around my locker, and made it to class in time for fourth period, Art, where I was able to sit in a corner and sketch and not talk to anyone about my holiday while I waited for my lunch period, to commence. I had too many confusing thoughts going through my head about the Hales, not to mention my family, to bother with making something up about having a merry Christmas, or a happy New Year, if anyone that I ran into wanted to make small talk.

I’d only been back in Washington for a day, and I already missed Cynthia. My sister’s tendency to kick my ass into gear had been invaluable in Mississippi, but I needed more, needed something to encourage me in that moment, in the hallway outside the cafeteria, to force me to take those steps through the double doors and face the man who’d been taking over my dreams for months now.

Instead, like a coward, I stood outside the cafeteria, scuffing the toe of my shoe over the ground while the noise from inside filtered out towards me.

“What are you doing?” I spun around to see Lauren making her way down the hall.

“Excuse me?”

“Why aren’t you going in?” She gestured to the cafeteria, her brow wrinkled.

“Oh. Um, I was trying to remember if I had Math homework I forgot to do. But, you know, I think I’m good.”

Lauren nodded slowly, still giving me a strange look, before she passed me and walked into the cafeteria. Steeling my nerves, I followed her through the doors. 

Involuntarily, my eyes were drawn to the table with the Hales and the Cullens. And they were all staring at me.

I jerked my head away, turned back to my usual table. Jess had half-turned in her seat, and was grinning at me, waving me over. She and Mike were holding hands under the table, and I couldn’t stop myself from smiling when I saw that. Angela actually got up to hug me, and asked me how my holiday was, and I shot off about how nice it was to be somewhere warm for a change, while Eric teased me about being too southern to function in Washington. But I was quickly able to turn the conversation to the Winter Formal, and Jess leaned over to show me all the photos she’d taken, which I’d already seen on Instagram, but, you know, it’s important to be polite.

“I really wish I could have been there,” I said, examining their group selfie. “But what did I tell you, was that the dress, or was that the dress?”

“That was the dress!” Jessica laughed, bumping my shoulder with hers. “Seriously, thank you so much for helping me find it… But, hey, what about what happened to you that night?”

Mike, Eric, and Lauren, all seemed to vary between interested and confused, while Angela looked like she wanted to hit Jessica. “Come on, Jess, we don’t need to bring that up.”

“Um… I got freaked out, I’m sorry I kind of spaced on you guys.”

“No, not that! You saw my car get smushed, I’d have been freaked too. After. When you and… well, you know who,” she cast a glance over her shoulder at the Hale table, “went off together!”

“Oh. Yeah, that.” I began chewing on my lower lip. “Well, I can promise you that Voldemort and I aren’t having some torrid affair, if that’s what you were wondering.”

“Come on, something had to happen! I’ll tell you what happened with the sister if you tell us what you guys talked about.”

I quirked a brow, and smiled. “What happened with Bella?”

“We sat in awkward silence for about an hour and Jessica got out of the car with me at my house instead of riding ten more minutes alone with her,” Angela cut in. At least Jess had the decency to duck her head while the rest of us laughed.

“But you went out on the closest thing Jasper Hale’s had to a date since he came to Forks, we do need some details,” Lauren added. I nodded along, and pulled out my lunch, picking at the bagel I’d packed.

After a few minutes of silence, I looked up to see them all staring at me. I gave them all a tight smile, but kept eating.

“Alice!” Jess burst out after another minute.

“Nothing happened. He took me to a diner so I could get something and like, I don’t know, not pass out from low blood sugar, then he drove me home, I packed up my stuff and went down to Mississippi. That’s not a really interesting story.”

“Alice, you haven’t lived here long, but still, at this point it’s been like three months, so you should know that they—“ Lauren gestured over her shoulder to the Hale table, “—They don’t talk to anyone. He took you to a restaurant. That does not happen.”

I thought, ‘Probably because you wouldn’t like it if they really took you out for dinner,’ but kept my face schooled neutral, even as my mind flashed back to the image of Jasper with blood dripping down his chin. Really not sexy at all, and there was probably something very wrong with me that I was willing to overlook it, but I’d have to at least hear him out before I decided how skeeved I was going to be by the whole ‘vampire’ thing.

I shook my head to myself; there really was be something wrong with me. But hey, from what I’d observed, it didn’t seem as if human actually was on the menu; I’d give them the benefit of the doubt.

There was a snapping noise, Angela let out a soft squeak, and both she, Lauren and Eric stared at something over my shoulder with sheer panic. I turned in my seat, and saw Edward Cullen standing at his table, his chair pushed back, his lunch tray snapped in two in his hands, glaring at me with unadulterated hatred. As one, all of his siblings turned to focus their amber eyes on me as well, before they all stood up in unison and walked out of the cafeteria.

“They were staring at us, right? I didn’t just imagine that?” Mike asked slowly, looking between all of us.

“Yeah, let’s just move along,” I said, eating another bite of my bagel. “Eric, you went skiing, what was that like?”

So, something had happened that had tipped my hand. They knew that I knew.

Well, it was bound to happen eventually. I didn’t need one of my dreams to know that I’d say something, tell Jasper, probably by the end of the day. After the dreams I’d had, I knew that I wasn’t going to be able to keep my feelings at bay, no matter what horrible things I unearthed, and I’d become rather resigned to that fact. I’d confront him, and deal with this. He wouldn’t hurt me. Edward might, judging by the black looks he’d been giving me, but I’d have seen that, if it was coming today. And I was calm, so calm. I probably shouldn’t have been, but I felt steady, steady enough to examine what was going on at least. “Bell’s about to ring, we should go.”

Eric insisted on walking me to the gym. “Cullen looked like he was about to go Columbine on us, I want to make sure you get to class in one piece.”

“Eric! That’s an awful thing to say, jeez!”

“Come on, you’re telling me you’d honestly be surprised to learn that one of them had like… Murdered a hitchhiker and the others had helped hide the body?”

“Don’t be mean, come on,” I shook my head, and Eric frowned at me. “I’ll see you later, okay?”

Eric crossed his arms. “Yeah, whatever,” and left me by the locker room doors.

Gym class and Math both dragged on. The second hand took eternities to tick along, never mind the minutes. I knew that in just a few measly hours I’d be sitting beside Jasper, with Emmett a few seats down, and he’d know that I knew.

I was slightly incorrect; when I got to History, Emmett was nowhere to be found. To that point, I didn’t think I’d seen Rosalie in the gym locker room after lunch either.

But Jasper was there, his face grim and his hands clenched into fists.

Okay, I thought sliding into my seat, a shiver of apprehension rising in my chest. This may have been a bad idea.


	11. 11. Chapter 11

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Heartbreak sucks, boys are terrible. Sorry for the long wait.

I’d barely sat down before Jasper was on his feet, towering over me. Even with the intimidation display, I tried to keep my expression neutral. “How was your break?” I smiled up at him.

“ _We need to talk,_ ” He hissed, bending close so that none of our other classmates, most of whom were looking on with interest, could hear us.

“That’s probably a good idea,” I agreed. He moved as if he were heading for the door, and I reached out and grabbed his wrist unthinkingly. He stared at me as if I’d just flipped him off, or burned him, but didn’t pull away. “Um,” I cleared my throat, feeling a little self-conscious, “I mean, later. After class. You know?”

“Alice—“ Whatever he had to say was cut off as Ms. Jordan walked in, and he retook his seat.

If I’d thought that the wait earlier was bad, this one was impossible. I didn’t register a word Ms. Jordan said; too preoccupied with trying to guess what the next few hours would hold. Sleet and rain pounded against the windows, but slowly dissipated over the next hour and a half, until Ms. Jordan dismissed the class with a reminder of our test next week.

I was slow packing my bag, butterflies blossoming in my belly. Jasper was standing by the door, waiting for me. I reluctantly swung my bag over my shoulder and took a step towards the hall.

Where Eric Yorkie was waiting. “Alice, need a ride?” He offered, all annoyance from our previous conversation having dissipated, carefully avoiding looking at Jasper, who had turned to glare at him.

“Um.” Behind Eric I saw Emmett, Rosalie, and Edward waiting. As I watched, Bella joined them.

Eric started going on about how his class let out early, and he knew I walked home, and the weather was pretty ridiculous, so he figured that since he was going that way anyways he might as well give me a lift, but I didn’t pay attention, too busy scrutinizing Jasper’s stony face.

“I’m sorry, Eric,  Alice and I need to discuss a class project,” Jasper said coolly. Eric seemed to shrivel before my eyes.

“Oh! Okay! That’s cool. I’ll see you around, Alice.” Eric nodded quickly to me before stepping back, nearly tripping over his feet to get away from Jasper. What a knight in shining armor.

I managed to wave.

Jasper made as if to walk to where his family waited, but I stayed where I was. I could talk to Jasper. I knew I could. But if they were all there…

“We’ll meet you at home,” Bella said to Jasper, loudly, as if she knew what I was thinking. She smiled at me, then grabbed Edward and Rosalie by their wrists, and dragged the two of them down the hall, Emmett following.

Jasper turned back to look at me. “You don’t have to be afraid,” he said softly.

“I’m not.” At his incredulous look, I repeated, “I’m really not! Just… Nervous.”

“So you are,” Jasper agreed, wonderingly.

I crossed my arms over my chest. “And not really sure how to start.”

“Me neither,” Jasper laughed, and I felt a wave of relief crash over me. We were okay. Everything was going to be okay.

I hoped.

“How did you… And what, exactly, do you…?” Jasper shook his head.

Lowering my voice, I said, “I know that the Quileutes have a legend about the Cold Ones.” That was a safe enough answer. Any question as to how I knew it could be deflected back to Aunt Mary’s research, rather than to Jacob, just in case I really was getting him in trouble.

I suddenly became aware of the crowded hallway around us, the students staring at us, and it reminded me of what Lauren said earlier, about how Jasper didn’t talk to anyone and how anything he does with a girl who’s not his sister is seen as gossip-worthy material right off the bat.

As if sensing my thoughts, Jasper suggested, “Maybe we should speak somewhere… Privately?”

“Yeah, that’s probably a good idea,” I nodded along. “I think it’s stopped raining.”

We walked out of the building together, my focus on deep breaths. The air was chilly, but I was right. It was clear outside. The air was fresh and clean, the way it always was after a good rain, every leaf still dripping the water it’s collected back onto the ground.

“We could go for a walk?” Jasper suggested, and I nodded, almost unconsciously taking the cut-through in the woods that led to my house, that would lead us to the clearing I’d seen in my dream. He stopped as we reached it, hanging a few feet back to look at me with quizzical amber eyes. I could feel the cold from the ground seep through the soles of my sneakers.

“Kind of murdery that you brought me to the middle of the woods to talk to me.” The words came to my mouth with ease, knowing he wouldn’t take offense.

Jasper laughed. “Sorry. Just didn’t want anyone to overhear this.”

“Well, I think you’ve accomplished that. No one around to hear me scream.” I wasn’t concerned with that at all, but levity’s always nice.

“You’re not _really_ afraid.”

“No,” a smile began to creep its’ way across my mouth. “I’m not.”

“So you heard the legends. What possible reason could you have for believing them?” He didn’t sound angry, just curious.

“Well, if not for the fact that you and your family all act shady as hell, I probably wouldn’t have tried to pry.” 

“Alice.” Jasper’s face became stern. “If I tell you this… I was serious before. You knowing puts you in more danger than before. Not from me or my family, but if someone else finds out that I told you, they might try to kill you.”

I sort of assumed so. The secrecy, the fear… If there were such a thing as vampires, they’d gone to great lengths to preserve the privacy of their identities for millenia. They likely wouldn’t be too thrilled with a high schooler finding out about them.

“I mean, there are lots of reasons someone might try to kill me. I’m a very annoying woman.” Also true. Just because he was some supernatural creature, and likely linked with dozens of others, didn’t make him special. I could very easily piss off someone in the mob.

“Don’t joke.” Before I could blink, he was in front of me, cradling my face in his cold hands. “If something happened to you, I couldn’t live with myself.”

“I know.” I wasn’t sure how I knew, but I did. I leaned forward, pressing my forehead to his shoulder. “But I already know.”

I think the intimacy of the action took us both by surprise, but it had felt so natural when I’d first seen it in my dream that I couldn’t help myself. After a moment, one hand of his wrapped around my waist, while the other found its way to my hair.

“You’re different,” he told me, “More so than anyone else I’ve ever met.”

“I could say the same about you,” I responded. “It’s not every day you meet a vampire in the flesh. Though maybe not the blood, how does that work?”

In a flash, Jasper pulled away.

“I-I was just trying to lighten the mood,” I explained, worried I’d made a mistake.

“No, no, it’s-“ He sighed. “I know. I’ve just… I’ve never talked about it with someone who was still… Human.”

I could tell he was waiting for a reaction. Waiting for me to run screaming out of the woods, no doubt. But all I did was nod, and say, “The legend said that… That your family didn’t hurt people, right?”

Jasper gave me a wry grin. “We do our best. Carlisle, our father, believes that it’s possible to resist our baser urges, and to maintain our better nature.”

“And you agree,” I said, as a statement rather than a question. It was a fact, right?

“I believe it’s possible- And better- for us to try.”

“Successfully, right?” I really, _really_ needed to lock him down with a ‘yes’ on that one.

“For the most part.” As if sensing my desire for reassurance, he minutely shook his head, and told me, “You wanted to know the truth. I’m just going to be honest with you.”

“Fair enough,” I acquiesced. “But like… You’re not about to eat _me_ , right? I’m sorry if that’s bigoted or something, but I do feel like I’m within my rights to ask, at least once.”

Jasper gave me an almost pitying smirk. “There’s no danger of that, believe me.”

“Good to know. Good to know.”

He laughed, and I laughed. This whole conversation was so much less stressful than I’d expected. Everything felt… Light.

“But how…” Jasper looked like he was trying to formulate the words. “You knew. You knew, even before you put everything together, you knew. What I’d look like in the sun. How could you have?”

I frowned at him. “I knew what, now?”

“Edward saw that you knew what happens when we go into the sun.”

I looked around, confused. “Um… You still talking to me? Because I was _totally_ tracking the whole vampire thing, but now I’m lost. Edward saw that I knew something? And what _does_ happen when you go into the sun? Aren’t vampires supposed to burst into flames?”

Jasper frowned back at me. “Wait, you didn’t know? Then how…” He shook his head. “Then this doesn’t make sense.”

“You’re telling me, right? Very confusing situation. It’s weird, in that it’s just getting confusing now, but…”

“Okay. Well, um.” Jasper gave me a quizzical look. “Sometimes, when we turn, you know, from human to… Well, this, we get certain abilities.”

“Like, running faster than a speeding bullet? No, that’s Superman,” I joked weakly, my arms wrapped around myself.

“We can… That’s already sort of included…” Jasper shook his head. “I thought you knew. Didn’t you know?” Sort of included? Clearly I _did_ _not_ know.

“Um… I’m sorry.” He looked so confused, I almost felt bad. But I couldn’t know what I didn’t know.

“I’ll try from the beginning, alright?” He said, after a moment’s pause. I nodded, and he continued, “When a human is turned, there’s some stuff that just comes with the territory. We’re faster, we’re stronger, our senses are better, we can’t be injured by any normal means.” Jasper caught my eye, and I nodded again, to indicate that I was tracking. “But then, sometimes there are… Bonus abilities, I guess, that we carry from the first life into the next. Edward was perceptive to what others were thinking, as a human, and now, in this life, if he’s within a close enough distance, he can hear thoughts.”

“Edward can read minds.” I shook my head. “Nope, saying it doesn’t make it less crazy, what the _fuck_?”

Jasper laughed. “Vampires you can handle, but mind-reading is a step too far, huh?”

“ _Yes_ , because I am just a goddamned human being, _that is way too fucking far, can he hear me right now_?” My voice was getting high pitched, borderline hysterical. Someone had been reading my mind? The one place that was supposed to be private, the one thing that was my own? What if he had heard me calling Rosalie sexy? What if he had told Jasper about all the times I’d daydreamed about licking stuff off his abs? _What if he knew about my occasional fantasy involving the tentacle monster_?

“Hey, hey, calm down,” Jasper had his hands on my shoulders, keeping me focused on him. “Look at me, Alice, alright? You’re too far away right now for him to hear anything, and he doesn’t go out of his way to spy on people—“

“Except apparently he _did_ , because he thinks I know something about how you look? Like, what the hell? How would I— _When_ would I— I only met you guys a few months ago!”

“Alice.” Suddenly, a wave of calm swept through me, and I was able to steady my breathing. “I’m sorry. We knew that you new something, and we had to figure out what it was. To protect ourselves. You understand, right?”

“ _No_ ,” I mumbled, petulantly, but when I wasn’t freaking out, I could understand the logic. “I’m still pissed,” I warned him.

“I know,” Jasper nodded. “But can we get to the bottom of this before you yell again?” He gave me a wry smile. “You might just be the most fascinating mystery we’ve come across this century.

I frowned, but shrugged. “Alright. If I’m supposed to know what you look like in the sun, why don’t you show me?”

Jasper glanced up through the branches, towards the cloud covered sky. “That’s one option,” he agreed. “But we’d need to get somewhere a little clearer.”

I was about to suggest we head back to the school lot, where his car was, the way normal people get around, but before I could, he held out his arms towards me. “May I?” He asked, and didn’t wait for a response before he scooped me into his arms. “Don’t worry, I won’t let you fall,” he reassured me.

I was about to ask him what the hell he thought he was talking about, or insist that he put me down, but then everything turned blurry.

It wasn’t like a rollercoaster; not really. Rollercoasters have twists and turns, loops and hills. They’re designed to make you feel as if you’re flying around, skidding and jerking through space. This was smooth, so smooth that I was sure I could have legibly written my homework throughout the whole thing. I could feel Jasper’s arms around me, shifting ever-so-slightly to keep me perfectly level. My eyes were wide, watching the world slip past me, impossibly quickly.

And then it stopped. That was the worst part. The world didn’t just snap back into focus; everything was swirling around me. I clung tighter to Jasper, my vertigo leaving me feeling as if I were about to fall out of his arms. “So that’s the ‘faster than a speeding bullet’ stuff, huh?” I slurred.

“Oh, shit. Alice, are you alright? I didn’t think—“

“‘m okay. Just put me down, please.” Jasper immediately set my feet under me, and I closed my eyes, sinking to my knees. I could feel Jasper’s hands on my forearms, trying to support me, but I pulled away. “I need to lie down,” I told him, leaning backwards until I was doing just that. “Just for a minute.”

“I’m sorry,” Jasper said. Even with my eyes shut, I could _feel_ him hovering. “I really am. I didn’t realize that you’d—“

“Get such bad head rush that I need a fucking sedative?” I asked. My heart was pounding, adrenaline already pumping through my system. “Just… Give a girl some warning next time, alright?” It didn’t take a genius to realize that he’d run me through the woods; although to where, I had no clue. But I could feel sunlight, warm on my face. “Okay.” I propped myself up on my elbows. “I’m done dying.” I opened my eyes.

_Oh_ , I thought. “Oh.”

There was Jasper, still bent worriedly over me. But he was… Shining.

The way he had been in my dreams.

“Oh. Oh, sunlight and the—“ I cut myself off. We were in a meadow, sun streaming through the late afternoon sky. “This is what you look like in the sun.”

“Yes.”Jasper nodded. “Edward said that you knew it.”

“No, I did,” I thought through everything we’d said so far. Guess he showed me his, time for me to show him mine. “I did, I just didn’t know that’s what I knew, you know?”

Jasper squinted at me. “No.”

“Um… I sort of have a secret too.” I bit my lip. “And I know that it sounds totally crazy—“

“I’ve just been explaining the finer points of vampirism to you; I don’t think that you have to worry about sounding crazy.”

“I see things,” I admitted, the words coming out in a rush. “Before they happen, sometimes, I’ll just… I go to sleep, and I dream, and I see what’s going to happen. And that— Seeing _you_ like that, I mean, all sparkling and all… I saw it months ago, in a dream. I just didn’t know what it meant. And I didn’t think too-too hard on it, because they’re not always right, you know? Like, any little thing can change, throwing everything out of whack, but I generally have a sense of what’s coming.” Jasper was quiet for a terrible, terrible moment, and I was floundering. I hadn’t seen this. I had no idea what he was going to say. He opened his mouth, finally, but I cut him off before he could begin. “Look, you just told me that… That fucking _vampires_ exist, and I was totally chill about that so maybe you could keep that in mind before telling me that I’m crazy, not psychic.”

Jasper chuckled. “I was going to say that things like that… They’re not unheard of.” I guess the look on my face gave away how I felt about this, because he continued, “I’m not saying that people having psychic dreams happens every day, but even before he was turned, Edward had a way of reading people. Nothing like what he can do now, certainly, but he could make guesses. And Bella… She’s got the opposite power. Nothing can invade her mind, Edward can’t read her thoughts, and that was the case even before she was turned. People have abilities, Alice. It’s not the strangest thing in the world.”

I nodded slowly, processing this. “Alright. Alright, so since you’re chill with my thing, and we’ve worked out this whole ‘how did you know that?’ deal, maybe you can go back to the vampire thing? You said Bella was turned, that means another vampire bit her, right?”

Jasper nodded, his face suddenly closed off. I wanted to reach out, but I wasn’t sure what part of what I’d said made him pull back, so I figured I’d just wait it out.

“Yes. It only takes a bite to turn someone. After that, it takes several days for the change to… Take effect.”

“Alright. How old are you, really?”

“Nineteen.”

I frowned. “You know what I mean. Do vampires age at all? The story—” I remembered that I wasn’t going to spill that it was Jacob who told me just yet “It mentioned that your family is the same family that made a deal with the Quileutes, so is it just an ‘age super slow’ thing, or…?”

“Once the change takes hold,” Jasper said, “That’s it. You’re… Frozen. As you were. We don’t age, we don’t get sick… The only thing that can kill one of us is another one of us. I was born over a hundred sixty years ago.”

That’s an awful lot. I leaned back against the grass, processing it all. But it was nothing too overwhelming, nothing like the mind-reading business…

“Do you have a special thing?” Jasper quirked an eyebrow at me, and I clarified, “I mean, you mentioned that Edward could read minds, and Bella was immune to that stuff. Do you…?”

Jasper ducked his head. “Ah. Yeah, I do.” If I didn’t know any better, I’d say he looked embarrassed.

“Well, come on, share with the class,” I teased.

God, I was already teasing him about it. Maybe I was just relieved, the mystery was solved, and he hadn’t called me a freak or a liar or delusional when I told him about the visions. But I know it was more than that. I was happy, here, in the sun, with him. No more of the doom and gloom. He may have warned me that he was capable of hurting me, of killing me, but I knew he wouldn’t. He could, but he wouldn’t. I was here, with him, and I was happy.

“I can sense feelings,” he admitted. 

I gave him a questioning look, and asked, “Do I need to have another mini break down about my privacy being invaded?”

“I hope not. I don’t know what makes you feel why you do, just that at any given moment you’re… Feeling whatever you are. And, to a certain extent I can change it.”

I’m sure that if that were true, he could feel the wariness begin to creep up my spine. “Change it?”

“I can’t influence the way you think about something, I can’t control your mind,” he clarified. “But if you’re upset about something, I can calm you down. Help you think rationally. Like when you were panicking over Jessica’s car getting hit.”

“Or ramp something up,” I said, thinking back on that history class, when we’d been assigned a group project and he and Emmett had embarrassed me. “Like, make me more pissed about something that I would have been normally?”

From the sheepish look on Jasper’s face, he was remembering it as well. “We were mean when you first came here, yeah. But usually we just… Scare people off. You were more stubborn than most, you wanted to be friends, so we…”

“Figured you’d be jackasses to me until I got the memo?”

“Pretty much.”

“When did the plan change?”

Jasper was quiet for a long moment. “Thanksgiving,” he finally admitted.

“Thanksgiving? When I got the… The bloody nose.” A lot about that day suddenly made sense, the dirty looks from Rosalie, Edward practically breaking down the door to the office. He had been trying to save my life. “If blood’s a trigger, why didn’t—“

“Blood is a trigger,” Jasper agreed. “But we don’t drink from humans. We drink animal blood, and we do so often enough that being around people, even bleeding people, doesn’t set us off like it would if we were… Thirsty. It’s possible to control our instincts. Carlisle _is_ a doctor, after all, he’s the best out of all of us at keeping it under control.” He paused to consider, and seemed to study my face, as if to make sure I wasn’t getting ready to run. “When I was alone with you, and you were bleeding… Even with all our years of practice, and self control, it should have been nearly impossible for me to stop myself. Had you been sent with Emmett or Rosalie, we might not be having this conversation.” I kept my face neutral. He’d made it clear from the beginning that things were dangerous. I’d known walking into a situation with vampires that it would likely include some risk. It didn’t matter. “But for some reason, I felt… No draw, no pull to your blood at all.”

“That hasn’t happened to you before?”

“Alice, that hasn’t happened to _any_ of us. At all. Carlisle and Rosalie are the best at abstaining, and even they _feel_ it. Fresh blood… Even in the ER, even after all these years, Carlisle still has to stay focused to stop himself from doing something regrettable. The temptation is always _there_ , even if we’d never want to act on it. But with you… It took Edward’s help, for me to see what’s happening.”

I was quiet, but nodded when he caught my eye, to let him know I was still with him. I knew something big was happening, and I let the moment wash over me. This was it. We were on track to what I’d been hoping for since I first came here… That we could be happy.

“Alice, I do… Smell you.” We both laughed, a little, at how ridiculous that sounded, but I took a moment to think back and remember that yes, I had put deodorant on this morning, and a spritz of perfume. And I’d be sure to never ever forget it any day there was a remote possibility of coming into contact with a Hale or a Cullen ever again. “You know what I mean. Right?” At my nod, he continued. “But I’ve told you that I can feel other people’s feelings… That’s what made me join our, ah, _vegetarian_ lifestyle in the first place, because to feel someone’s terror in their last moments… It’s too awful.” He looked down, and I reached out and took his hand in mine, unthinkingly. He gave me a soft look, for just a minute, before continuing. “However, it’s the sort of thing that’s a background noise, to me. And it depends on proximity. So someone’s feelings are never the forefront of my thoughts, unless I’m focusing on them, and the person is nearby.” I nodded again, then felt both his cool hands envelop mine, lightly enough that I could break out of his grasp if I wanted to. “Alice, from the day I’ve met you, your feelings have been in my head. Wherever you are, whatever you’re doing… I can feel it. Even when you were in Mississippi, I could feel everything you were feeling. That’s never happened to me before. And I couldn’t even notice it at first, it felt too natural, like something had clicked into place. It feels like a second skin, like something that just _belongs_. And it wasn’t until Thanksgiving, when Emmett was talking about it, that Edward saw it, in my head. That you’re… You’re there. And that’s why hurting you has never even occurred to me. It would be like tearing out my own heart.”

There it was again. That overwhelming feeling rising in my chest, that was making my breath come in short, hitched gasps. This boy was… Oh God. This boy.

“Then _why_ did you tell me to leave?” My voice broke, and I felt monumentally stupid as I reached up to wipe at the tears in my eyes, but before I could, his thumb was brushing over my cheek, catching them for me, before he pulled me closer, still holding my hand with his other one.

“I can’t stand the thought of hurting you,” Jasper repeated, “And you’d be much safer in Mississippi, far away from all of this.”

I raised an eyebrow. “You do know people die all the time, right? I could slip and break my neck, or crash a car, or have a safe fall on me from a skyscraper—“

Jasper cut me off. “I’m aware, Alice.” He gave me a mock-sour look for a moment, before he continued, “But that doesn’t change the fact that the risk factor exponentially increases the more time you spend with me.”

“As an expert at analyzing risk factors,” I tapped two fingers to my temple, “Don’t I get to make that decision?”

A small, slow smile began to work its way across Jasper’s face. “I suppose you do.” He leaned in, for a moment, and I was sure that he was about to kiss me, but he stopped, inches away. “It’s getting late. I should get you home.”

I raised an eyebrow but otherwise didn’t move a muscle. He was so close, one hand still holding mine, and, as I waited, the other snaking around my waist. He paused, and I smiled, encouragingly, despite the fact that my heart was in my throat.

Slowly, agonizingly slowly, he leaned in and pressed his lips to mine.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for bearing with me. I know this chapter's been a long time coming but my dirty, rotten, cheater of an ex left me in a very non-romancy place. I hope to have 12 out before the year is up, though! Also, I usually post to FF.net a few days earlier, since the format is easier for me. If you don't like trolling FF for updates, follow me on Tumblr for the latest news! I'm unfortunate-twihard.tumblr.com


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